Jacksonian March
by Storyling
Summary: 22-year-old Naruto hadn't really been thinking when he had asked for guardianship over Uchiha Sasuke five years ago. But now that Sasuke was a ninja, Naruto finds he has little choice but to come out of retirement to keep Sasuke in line. AU, no pairings.
1. chapter one

**Summary:** AU. 22-year-old Naruto hadn't really been thinking when he had asked for guardianship over Uchiha Sasuke, five years ago. But now that Sasuke was a ninja, Naruto finds he has little choice but to come out of retirement to keep Sasuke in line. Damn it.

**Disclaimer:** I do not own Naruto.

* * *

**Jacksonian March**

chapter one

* * *

_Uzumaki Naruto._

_Age 17._

_Alive._

_Genin. _(a hasty, barely legible handwriting follows with detail) _refer back to __"__that event__"__ ten years ago; __eligible __for jounin, __skill-wise; __surveillance__ recommended. unstable. dangerous. the nine-tails__'_ (following words are scribbled out to the point of illegibility)

_57 D-level missions. 23__ C-level miss__ions. 4__ B-level missions. 1 __S__-level__ mission._

(in bold) Retired. Approved by the Hokage.

_Lineage- __Namikaze Minato (__father, __deceased)__ & __Uzumaki __Kushina__ (mother, __deceased)__, no confirmed siblings or extended family._

_Notable features- blond, blue_(scribbled out)_ violet eyes, 5__'__11__"__, three horizontal, parallel scars on each cheek_ (in the same, hasty handwriting, it continues)_ wears a constant look of nonchalance, capable of lots of_(underlined three times)_ noise__, sometimes seen in orange._

_Requested guardianship over Uchiha Sasuke._

The verdict is not passed until the end of the week.

_Approved._ _Tentative._

_Date- five __years__ ago._

* * *

It was funny how quickly things—things like _routine_—spun out of control in less than twenty-four hours.

The morning had carried itself in its regular, monotonous rhythm, with the sunlight penetrating past the old, hand-me-down curtains that he had half-heartedly tacked onto the window by his bed some years ago. It had proceeded exactly as it did every day: he had slammed his hand a couple of times on his well-abused alarm, had rolled out of bed, had bodily dragged himself to the bathroom. He had scowled at his reflection, had undergone the daily dose of _self-hate_, had brushed his teeth. Everything had gone perfectly peachy.

The afternoon had been no different. He had put off his share of the chores (the grocery shopping, the laundry, the dishes, and the vacuuming), had spent a large chunk of his time at Ichiraku. He had forced himself to ignore the looks of venomous loathing from the general public, his hands tucked into the pockets of his sweater. His feet had carried him down the same pattern of streets and alleyways that he had been treading since his status had gone from son-of-a-legend to ex-ninja and monster (shortly put, about ten years in between _then _and _now_) with a majority of his attention turned up towards the sky. It had been a good day, relatively speaking.

He'd had every intention of spending the approaching dusk in the same, mind-numbing lull, already crouched before the memorial stone, tracing names of familiarity with his eyes. After this, he would have gone back to his apartment, pick some ridiculous excuse to feed Sasuke (whenever the kid got home from self-training) as to _why _he hadn't gone grocery shopping, hadn't done the laundry, hadn't done the dishes or the vacuuming. They would argue for a while, followed by supper (curry, tonight), followed by good-natured wrestling, insult-exchange, and finally, a quiet moment with each other, reflecting on their day. He never really had anything to reflect on, but this was his favorite time of the night, so he would lie there, connecting the dots of his ceilings together, feeling content for a little while.

Then the clock would ring, and it would have been time for bed. He would badger Sasuke into relinquishing the bathroom sooner than Sasuke preferred, would take a shower, and head for Sasuke's room. After a brief moment of teasing, he'd bend down, put his hand down onto Sasuke's forehead and whisper a _good night_. If he was lucky, Sasuke would sometimes roll himself to the side, exposing his back, and respond (gruffly) in kind. He spent_those _nights in inexplicable joy, eyes closed, lips grinning, until the night surrendered him to slumber.

Next morning, the process would repeat, except he'd do the chores. But the fundamental outlines of his day would remain largely unchanged.

Now.

That was how things were _supposed _to go.

Somewhere in the middle of when he had been busily reading and rehearsing the names of the dead in his head, there had been a break in the system.

It started off slow as a simple shadow that befell the patch of grass a little bit to his right. And from there, it had spun out of control.

He _knew _that shadow. He _knew _that presence, that man, that gaze that pressed heavily against his back. His first instinct, for the briefest moment of a second, was to run. But note the _brief_; you did not run from people like _Morino Ibiki_, especially when the man had found it imperative to find the time to seek you out himself.

And so he took a deep breath, swallowed the thick lump of bitter aftertaste, and craned his gaze upwards. The sky was cloudless.

_Damn_. How boring.

"Uzumaki Naruto."

_Damn, damn, damn_. Ibiki started the conversation _first_—spindles of adrenaline and growing dread unfurled themselves from the deep recesses of his mind. He couldn't just ignore the man—no, you _did not _ignore men like Morino Ibiki, just like you didn't run from them—but he didn't have to be entirely cooperative either. So he didn't bother turning, simply raising a hand in half-meant greeting. "Yo."

"You can be a difficult man to find," Ibiki commented.

Naruto disagreed. "Eh, I'm here every day."

"So I've been told."

Ibiki's steps were barely audible, light and silent against the grass despite the man's imposing stature and frame. Naruto shifted himself a little bit to the side, edging in an extra centimeter of distance between them, and flicked his eyes to the upper corner to catch sight of Ibiki staring down at the memorial stone. The edges around the man's eyes tightened—this was a common symptom to all those that visited this rock, a common symptom of those that lost someone they called a _comrade_. Naruto glanced away. It was an unspoken rule of thumb, this tact.

It was an odd scenario, one so bizarre that Naruto found it difficult to employ his regular dose of impatience. Ibiki was filling the necessary quota of respect required of all those that treaded within the half-mile radius of the memorial stone, remembering, just as Naruto had been.

Thankfully, Ibiki didn't seem interested in drawing out the moment any more than necessary. "I'm a little pressed for time."

Reading between the lines, filling in the gaps, was far too easy; the pleasantries and the bullshit would be skipped right over, going straight into business. That suited Naruto just fine. "Right, okay. So, what do you want?"

"Umino Iruka was hospitalized this afternoon."

But that. _That _didn't.

Naruto underwent a full-body twitch in which the anxiety took on the distinct taste of _dread_ and a small dose of conditioned terror. He rose quickly—perhaps a little _too _quickly—and fought to steady himself as his muscles readjusted to their sudden change in position. That didn't stop his voice, however. "_Hospitalized? _What the hell for?! Is he alright?"

"He's stabilized," Ibiki said. He turned to angle his body towards Naruto, immobilizing him with the stare that had broken the greatest of men, tearing their secrets directly from their lips. It was the only reason why Naruto had placed an immediate _halt _order on the instinctual readying of the series of movements that would carry him to the hospital, to Iruka's side.

"The Academy was attacked," Ibiki continued, his sharp gaze never leaving Naruto, "Several of the students could not be evacuated in time."

Panic rattled at his instincts, flaring them into working order as the word _Academy _and _attack _echoed against his eardrums in tandem.

Academy. Attacked.

_Academy._

_Sasuke._

Ibiki caught his upper arm a split second before Naruto attempted to dart. His fingers were unrelenting, merciless, and Naruto made a dim realization that it was for this strength and Ibiki's line of work—where fleeing fugitives were of the norm—that the man must have been hand-picked to deliver this message. "Hold it, Uzumaki. The Academy grounds have been sealed off. You won't find any leads there." A short pause, and then, "If you go out there _now_, without any background knowledge, you'll only add to the body count."

Naruto forced himself relaxed a fraction, only to doubly tense when Ibiki's fingers grew tighter, in silent warning for worse news to come.

"I'll keep this brief," Ibiki said at last.

"Yeah," Naruto swallowed, "Please."

It was a hostage situation. The students that had not been evacuated had been carried off to a cot in the outskirts of the village, held under the guard of ninjas of Stone—

"_Stone?_" Naruto had intervened, brows furrowing dangerously, "How the hell?"

—whose presence had been confirmed by Iruka's last breath before falling into such a state of emergency that he had been immediately transferred to the nearby hospital. The rest of the information came from the mole, a man named Mizuki Touji, freshly named missing-nin and now ex-instructor of the Academy. One of Iruka's co-workers. He hadn't managed the getaway as cleanly as the Stone Chuunins, leaving him under the jurisdiction of one Morino Ibiki. (Here, Naruto had to wince, though pity ranked among the last of what he felt for the individual in question.) Mizuki had helped the ninjas of Stone gain access into the village. (It was with much relief that Naruto realized that the Stone hadn't been able to infiltrate on the sole basis on the lax security deployed at the village gates.) Several bodies of students had been then delivered to the village as a warning; a primitive, though unfortunately effective, method in striking terror into the opposing side.

The terms of exchange was simple, Mizuki had been forced to explain: the Scroll of Sealing for the remaining children. The deadline was by midnight, tonight.

Ibiki handed him a piece of paper next. Naruto accepted it with his free hand, frowning as he ran his attention down the—_list of names_; names of the children currently held as hostages. Eyes growing slightly wider in diameter, he skimmed right down to the end, read: _Uchiha Sasuke_. The hand on his arm squeezed in warning when Naruto felt himself jerk, an instinctive response to throw himself into the fray because _Sasuke was out there_.

"It's fortunate that we caught Mizuki," Ibiki told him, "He would have told them of the Hyuuga and Uchiha—if their family lines were revealed, it's doubtful that they will be released, even if we meet their demands."

It was also quite possible that the Stone had figured it out for themselves and had killed the children already, their bodies wrapped neatly into packages to be delivered to the Village of Stone for experimentation and study—it was a possibility Ibiki did not voice, perhaps out of mercy. He didn't have to; Naruto was growing starkly aware of the familiarity of the situation. The urgency, the initial rush of adrenaline, the professional dread and panic. He grimaced.

"Heh."

Ibiki raised an eyebrow.

"Just thinking how many times we've been through this before," Naruto quipped lightly. It was purposeful, this fake cheer, meant to bolster the morale in rookies, to reinforce determination in veterans. "So. What do you want me to do?"

"Nothing," Ibiki said.

Naruto blinked. "What?"

"Nothing," Ibiki repeated, "You are to stay within the village walls until the situation's been resolved."

"_Bullshit_." His hands curled into fists. "That's _bullshit!_"

With a shake of his head, Ibiki released Naruto's arm at last, tucking his hands into the pockets of his coat. "We were to inform the parents and guardians of the children involved. It's requested that you do not do anything rash."

"Shove it. That's straight off the paper, Morino." He shook his head in accentuated disbelief and felt himself twitch, just once, in impatience and agitation. "Like they'd send _you, _in the middle of a goddamn emergency situation, to tell me that Sasuke got kidnapped? Give me a break!"

"They were orders. I'm just doing my job, Uzumaki."

"Cut the crap," Naruto snarled, baring his teeth, "_Fuck _formalities! Tell me what the _fuck _you want me to do! Or I'll go out there myself, orders or no orders!"

"Indeed." There was bleak satisfaction which underlined the words, completed by a set with the dark smirk that overtook Ibiki's features, and Naruto realized that this was probably what Ibiki had predicted and waited for. When Ibiki's right hand resurfaced from the depths of his pocket, there was something white and grinning attached to it. Naruto stared, mutely accepting the mask when Ibiki pushed it into his possession. "Know this, Uzumaki. If you leave these walls before this situation has been resolved with this mask, your ninja status will be reinstated as a Genin. And Hokage-sama is not willing to rebuke it a second time."

It wasn't that the old man wasn't going to; the old man _couldn't_. Not with a council set so vehemently on the prospect of using his lineage in their game of politics, despite the monster sealed within. Naruto drew his lower lip into his mouth and bit it once, drawing blood.

"Should you decide to leave on your own accord _without _the mask," Ibiki continued, "You will be arrested upon sight. If you flee, you will be labeled as a missing-nin."

_You're too dangerous._

Naruto squeezed his eyes shut.

This mask was the guillotine order on his self-induced retirement, with emotional blackmail—_Sasuke_—as its ally. As frustrating as it was, it wasn't much of a choice—not really. He closed his eyes, attempting his hand at rational thought: he toyed with the knowledge of the existence of many, competent ninjas within the village with sets of skills that could be utilized to retrieve the hostages verses his emotions: the simple, single word of _Sasuke_ entailed. Naruto, by nature, preferred to follow his gut than any roundabout thoughts crafted by his mind; this _really _wasn't much of a choice.

Comprehension, coupled with bitter resolution, was a terrible, terrible thing.

"Back-up will be sent in half an hour," Ibiki told him. Naruto opened his eyes as Ibiki turned his head back towards the memorial stone. "It is preferable if you finished things up before then."

Naruto snorted as he hefted the mask upwards towards his face, swallowing thickly as he squinted through the narrow eye-slits. "Ten minutes. Five minutes of travel time."

"Don't underestimate them," Ibiki warned.

Making a dismissive gesture, he shrugged. "I'm not. See you later, Ibiki-san."

Ibiki did not answer, not for a solid minute. Naruto had been half-way through a fidget, and had steeled his resolve to ignore Ibiki's lack of an answer and hurry along to the mission location to finish this business—spilling some blood, cutting through flesh; the usual. Finally, before Naruto could flick himself into the wind, Ibiki drew up a hand with a single kunai dangling from his index finger.

"You'll need this."

Oh yeah. Naruto accepted the weapon almost sheepishly; he had traded in his pouch of weapons when he had retired ten years ago. Killing people was notably harder, though not impossible, without something sharp and metallic added to his person.

"Don't die, Naruto."

Surprised, Naruto lifted his head, met Ibiki's gaze through the mask, and smiled. Trusting his expression to be conveyed through his eyes, Naruto did a mock-salute, molded his chakra (it had been so _long_), and vanished, leaving mere words in his wake: "Got it."

* * *

It had been Chouji that had made the first kill out of their dwindled number of eight, driving a kunai right into the jugular.

The guard had only managed a half-gurgle before he had fallen forward, his eyes wide open in shock, lips parted in a voiceless scream. Shikamaru had been the one who had acted next, darting forward to catch the body to lay it soundlessly against the ground. And he had remained like that, kneeled before the body with shaking arms while Chouji had emptied the contents of his impressive lunch in a distant corner.

Sasuke reminded himself to breathe.

Behind him, various, stifled noises of shock were thrown into the wind.

"What the _fuck_..." Kiba whispered.

Sakura's voice was but a muffled sob, synchronized with the faint gasp Hinata had released when the spell of moment had broken.

Placing a hand over his mouth, Sasuke reminded himself of his lineage, of his ancestry, of his fate as avenger—as the to-be murderer of the murderer of his people—that had been decided for him since the age of seven. The bile, in response to his thoughts, thankfully remained in the confines of his stomach. Sasuke gritted his teeth, swallowed thickly, and allowed himself to look away from the body as Shikamaru closed the eyes with clumsy, panicked fingers.

"Chouji?" Shikamaru croaked.

"I'm okay," Chouji answered, wiping aside a drool of vomit. He shook his head, stumbled a few steps before he collapsed back onto his rear, an arm's length away from where Shikamaru remained kneeling. "What about you, Shikamaru...?"

"Me too," Shikamaru said, leaning back away from the corpse. He supported the rest of his weight with positioned arms behind him to leverage and keep him stable in his seated position as he evened out his breathing, _one, two_. "Okay."

"That was unexpected," Shino murmured.

"You think?" Kiba snapped, his arms tightening around Akamaru as the pup whined out a low, pitiful whimper, nuzzling into the chest of his master. "_Shit_, Shikamaru, what the hell—"

"We don't have a lot of time," Shikamaru cut in, "The guards change every twenty minutes. Listen to me closely, all right?"

Apparently not patient enough to wait for the nods he had elicited, Shikamaru turned his attention to Hinata, who jumped, startled, as he addressed her, "Hinata."

"Y-yes?" she squeaked.

"Can you get a quick estimate on how many guys we're dealing with?" Shikamaru made a vague motion with a hand as he slouched forward into a more comfortable position. "As accurate as possible. But make it fast; we don't want to alert them."

"I... I'll try," she murmured. Sasuke tensed as the soft signature of the Byakugan flared briefly into life, only to blink out on the next beat. He watched as Hinata draw in a breath before she gave her answer, "Six... in total. One of them... he's leaving to... to scout, I think."

"Thanks," Shikamaru nodded, "Well, at least we outnumber them."

"What the _hell _is going on?" Kiba demanded.

"I'm getting there," Shikamaru said irritably, "Jeez, so pushy. Alright..."

Shikamaru's plan was simple, almost elegant. It was a competent, impressive plan that took all possible options from the narrow range of actions that the situation barely allowed; it was decent, acceptable, borderline _good_. That is, if the blaring _but _hadn't stuck to the end of the explanation like a misplaced kunai. They had all been drawn them all forward towards Shikamaru's voice, anxious to hear the conclusion of the instructions they were all tucking away into the recess of their memory, when Shikamaru just—_stopped_.

When the boy said no more, Sasuke leaned back to properly digest the words, and filled in the silence with his thoughts.

Chance. A large majority of the plan was based on _chance_, on luck; simply put, an organized hit and, when possible, run, just as Shikamaru and Chouji had demonstrated only a few minutes before. Lips thinning, Sasuke settled on his opinion on the whole matter: he didn't like it.

Kiba, apparently, had drawn the same conclusions. "I don't like it."

"What's there to like?" Shikamaru muttered, his voice stiff and intolerant to the echoed objections spread evenly across the eight. "There's nothing wrong with running away. We'll die if we stay here any longer."

"We'll _die _if we go out there!" Kiba snapped, "Are you out of your mind? Weren't you paying attention to what's been happening the past few hours?!"

A rhetorical question. Shikamaru tsked and glanced away, his eyes flickering as a physical manifestation of his cognitive process of remembrance was triggered by Kiba's tactless words. Sasuke closed his own, looking away from the monochrome visuals of the dark, inner architecture of the cot they had been confined to for the past few hours in the only way he could. Those hours—they had been—still _were_—trapped tightly in the center of what he could only label as terror. It was a type of terror he had felt only once before. He squeezed his eyelid closer to the skin, trying to close his eyes tighter.

_Not now_, he told himself. _Not now_.

Mind set and emotions brought back under control, Sasuke allowed himself to see again, regarding the seven others—eight, with himself included—that had managed to survive the systematic massacre the enemy ninjas had subjected them to. One by one, their numbers had shrunk, throats cut open _right by that door_ until their (ex)classmate had drawn breath for the last time. It was only after a long, merciless death that the body had been hauled outside to be sent back to the village, a warning.

Sasuke knew a hopeless situation when he saw one. When he was _in _one. But he had no plans on dying, not now, not today, not _ever_; not until Itachi was dead and rotting.

And currently, to survive, Shikamaru's plan was all they had.

Setting his jaw, he untangled his arms, giving the rest of the remaining student population a flat look. "I don't feel like waiting until they decide to kill us."

"One in," Shikamaru said. He seemed to share a silent exhale with himself as he passed Sasuke a glance of gratitude; Sasuke twitched and didn't meet his eyes. Shikamaru didn't seem bothered. "Anybody e—"

"I'm in," Chouji said.

Shikamaru gave him a funny look. "Chouji. We're in by default."

"Oh." Chouji gave him a sheepish smile. "Just making sure."

A smirk twitching at the corner of his lips, Shikamaru swept across the remaining five with his eyes. "Well?"

"The probability of success is low," Shino said slowly. But he too, got to his feet. "However, it is not impossible."

"You too, man?" Kiba shook his head, and clicked his tongue in agitation. "What do you think, Akamaru?"

A low whine answered him.

"Yeah, I kinda figured." Shaking his head, Kiba flashed them all a grin. "Ah, what the hell. Not like we got anything else going for us, eh? Uchiha's right—for once. It's much better than waiting around to be killed. That would be such a _lame _way to die."

"I..." They turned to Hinata, her eyes turned determinedly towards a faraway corner even as she rose. She shuffled her feet, and finally looked up. "I... believe we can do it."

Shikamaru's expression eased easily into a satisfied smirk.

"_No!_" It was Sakura's voice, chapped and crumbling under the pre-symptoms of dehydration and unadulterated terror. "We should wait! We should wait until someone rescues us. They've got to be waiting for their chance, we should just—"

"If we wait," Sasuke murmured, his voice low and dangerous, "We'll die."

"No! Sa-Sasuke-kun... don't you see? If we resist, they'll kill us!" Sakura wailed, pressing a palm to her eye as she began the slow decent into tears. "They... they already killed so many of us... if we try to fight them, we'll get killed!"

"We will die either way," Shino said, turning his face away, "I'd prefer to die fighting."

"Me too," Chouji said earnestly.

Ears covered by her hands, Sakura proceeded to curl into herself where she remained seated, shaking her head fervently. To her credit, she was crying with only quiet hiccups as audio; not loud enough to alert the enemy outside. "Shut up," she whispered, "Shut up! I can't believe you guys are talking about dying so easily! If you die—"

Ino slapped her. "Oh, stop it!"

Sakura blinked through her tears, pressing a hand on her cheek. "Ino..."

"_Sakura_," Ino snapped. She slowly rose to her feet, eyes narrowing as she placed her hands on her hips, "You listen to me. If we stay, we'll die. If we go out there and _do _something about this, we might survive. We might even get away. Shikamaru's plan is decent, okay? You got some serious brains behind that big forehead of yours—why don't you _use _it?"

"I..." Sakura bit at her lip once more. "How can you be so sure?"

Hinata laid a gentle hand on her shoulder, standing firm even as Sakura underwent a full-body twitch. "Sakura-chan... we... we won't die. If we... protect each other..."

"We're all freaked out about this," Ino said, "And we'll freak out some more _later_. We got lucky and survived this far, but now we _have _to get out of here." She paused, and then laid a hand on Sakura's head, smoothing the pink locks back with comforting fingers. "We're all but ninjas now, you know."

"H-huh?"

"Today's Graduation Day," Ino murmured. The atmosphere dropped into a sudden, depressive lull as various versions of _she__'__s right _and _oh yeah _was reflected in the minds of those still breathing. She released a soft exhale, and gave Sakura's head a final pat. "I know _you _would have passed. Your big forehead would have never allowed you to fail, you stupid _girl_. You're a real ninja now."

"We all are," Sasuke cut in. He fought down the slight flush that dared to tint the tips of his ears when all sets of eyes turned to him incredulously, and narrowed his at Kiba's widening grin. "And since we are, something like this would have happened to us eventually."

"Eventually," Shino agreed, "After a few more years of training, perhaps."

"Don't be such a downer, Shino," Kiba said, "Even the Uchiha bastard is giving us a talk."

Sasuke glared. Kiba stared right back, all teeth and cheer. Much to Sasuke's annoyance and chagrin, Shino seemed to ponder the point, followed by a slow nod in agreement. "Ah."

"Ah? _Ah?_ That's it?" Kiba demanded.

With the barest twitch at the corner of his lips, Shino amended, "It is an honor to die for the village."

"Uh, not the best way to make us feel better, man."

Shikamaru raised a hand to his forehead, rubbing it. "Look, we're running out of time. So I'll be honest."

They quieted, all attentive to his words to come.

"I'm scared," Shikamaru said bluntly. Gauging their reactions, he went on, almost cautiously, "Until now, we were just classmates. You two," he pointed at Sakura and Ino, "are too loud. You hurt my ears. You too." The finger went briefly to Kiba, and then moved onwards to Shino. "You freak me out." To Hinata, "I don't really know you." Finally, to Sasuke, "I'm not sure if I've ever liked you."

Sasuke scowled.

"Except for Chouji, I found you all tiresome," Shikamaru finished. His expression sobered. "But right now, if I just go off with Chouji, I'll get killed. If I play for solo, I'll get killed. There's no if's about it. Same goes for all of you. I..." He tsked, and rolled his eyes to the ceiling. The words he spoke next seemed rather painful to utter; Sasuke couldn't refute that claim, upon hearing them. "Right now, even if I might not like you, I need you guys."

"To watch your back," Sasuke said, his tone experimental, watching Shikamaru's expression sharply.

"Yeah, exactly," Shikamaru agreed, scratching the side of his neck, "These people are _real _ninjas, probably with experience that we won't see for another few years. We've just sort-of turned Genin—" Some faces broke into weak smiles at that, "—and we're already up against this sort of troublesome..." He trailed off, seemingly in search for the politically correct term to employ, before the endeavor was abandoned with a shake of his head. "Anyway, there's no guarantee that this will work. We might die."

"What else is new?" Kiba said sardonically, raising an eyebrow. Despite the simulated confidence, however, a notable shake colored his next few words as he ran a hand through his hair. "Hell, we know that, already."

"Being if we stay here, we'll be killed off like cattle," Ino finished smoothly. The corner of Shikamaru's eye ticked in unspoken exasperation, but he nodded stiffly in agreement. With a smirk, she waved it off. "It doesn't take a genius to know that, Shikamaru. I don't care. I'm still in."

"Didn't say you weren't," Shikamaru muttered irritably.

"We can make it," Hinata spoke up, without stutter. She flushed when the majority's attentions were on her. She gripped at her hands. "I... we'll be working together. If... if we work together, we'll..."

"We'll come out alive," Shino completed.

Hinata nodded.

But there it was—the flaw. It was only _if_ they were lucky. It was only _if_ this make-shift cell of ex-classmates, self-endowed Genins worked well enough to protect each other from the weapons of ninjas twice their skill would any of them survive. They had to follow Shikamaru's instructions to the dot, watch out for each other, _work together_. Sasuke closed his eyes briefly, feeling the edges of a migraine dig its fingers into his mind. He wasn't a team player. Trusting these children—_you__'__re a kid too, Sasuke_—trusting that they would protect him, to keep him alive? This entire situation left a vile aftertaste under his tongue. Everything relied largely on that _if_.

A voice from his memories found that time appropriate to speak up—_not this loner-thing again. Jeez. Listen, Sasuke..._

"I won't die," Sasuke said. The determination wedged past the last of the fear and hopelessness, snapped his open, and his fists curled into fists. "I won't die here."

_You can__'__t do this alone._

"There are still things I need to do," he finished. Like killing his brother, avenging his clan, _restoring _his clan. Like going back to the apartment (back _home_), making sure the idiot did his chores. "I'm not going to die here."

Not the best of speeches, but the words had their effect.

Ino nodded firmly in agreement, a smirk spreading over her lips. "Damn straight!"

Murmured agreements rode through the group, stopping short at their eighth.

"You're all insane," Sakura whispered, shaking her head. But finally, _finally_, she was smiling, timid and fragile, but no longer hesitating. "But so am I, huh? I'm here, after all." She tucked a strand of hair behind her ear, leaned away from the wall and stood steadily on her own two feet. "Maybe this _isn__'__t _so crazy."

"Watch my back," Kiba summarized, smirking at them all, "And I'll watch yours."

This was it, then.

Shikamaru gave the ultimatum. "Alright. You know what to do?" Nods, all around. Resolutions set in concrete. He smiled tiredly. "Good. Time's up."

* * *

When you're about to die, it is told that your life flashes by, skipping through the most important moments of your life, highlighting the people that you will miss, the people that will miss _you_ once you're gone. It's a phenomenon across all countries, prejudiced against neither ninjas nor civilians, taking them all. Death was equity; it didn't matter if you had been a legend, or whether you had been the greatest of heroes or the vilest of villains—once you died, it was just that. You died, your life flashed, and your lungs inhaled one, last intake of oxygen before it all stopped.

What happens to you then? Some say you cease to exist, snatched from the living into a darkness that sent fear down the spines of many men and women. This type of fear, borne of that darkness, was a fear rivaled by nothing else in this world, or in the next. If there was a next.

When you're about to die, you hear voices. Time slows. Death stares you in the face. Your life flashes.

He hadn't been much of an exception.

The good things,

_Sorry, Sasuke. Maybe next time._

_J__ust between you and me, whenever your father__'__s alone with me, all he talks about is you._

_As expected, you are my child._

the terrible things,

_Foolish little brother... if you want to kill me, then blame me. Hate me. And live on in shame._

and things he had found he could still enjoy, even in the face of the direction his life had taken;

_Oi, Sasuke! You think this curry__'__s still good?_

_Eh?! I__'__m doing the dishes _again?_ No way!_

_I__'__m going out for a bit. Don__'__t forget to eat, alright?_

_Listen, Sasuke... you can__'__t do this alone._

there had been absolutely no omissions.

The events leading up to this moment were starkly vivid in his mind, a frame-by-frame retelling of his—and his classmates'—battles against the ninjas beyond the doors of the cot. Initially, the battle had been nothing more than a mere frenzy of flailing limbs and flying metal, driven solely by adrenaline and their wills to survive. They had all been just children, armed with but a standard pouch of weapons and unpolished aims. Kunais of uncountable numbers had been thrown, barrages of shurikens showered down upon the enemy; somewhere along the line, the lucky shots had turned into something more synchronized. Somewhere in the middle of the messy array of blood and sweat and battle, the group of classmates, of children, had morphed into an eight-man cell.

Sasuke wasn't sure how it had happened, just that it _had_. Organization had settled in. Teamwork had become like breathing. Their mismatched sets of skills had clicked together, had _worked_, complimenting each other's. More than once, he had felt a kunai slice through the air behind his unprotected back, driving away an enemy ninja that had been ready to punch a hole through his torso. More than a handful of times, he had caught sight of an opening in Shikamaru's (or Kiba's or Shino's or Ino's) formation that the enemy had been attempting to utilize, and paused briefly to flick his wrist to release shurikens to force the enemy back.

They hadn't been winning, but they hadn't been just pushed around either.

Still, he supposed it had only been a matter of time until one of them had slipped in such a way that couldn't be salvaged by a timely kunai. It had only been a matter of time until the enemy had snapped in irritation, going for overkill via some obscure _doton_ jutsu that they yelled into the air. The only thing that had surprised him about the situation had been the fact that _he _had been the one that had slipped (the first to slip), his balance momentarily robbed by a sleek spray of mud, strategically placed.

His body had tensed as the jutsu tore through the ground, towards his body, deafening all cries of _Sasuke!_ and _Sasuke-kun!_ from his ears.

When you're about to die, your life flashed before your eyes. Sasuke's had been in the last quarter of that flash, almost at the finish line when an entirely different flash flickered into view. A yellow light—the color strangely resembled the sun (burning brightly, in all its glory) that he had seen to be hanging in the day after of the extinction of his clan. The arms that wrapped around him to whisk him away felt suspiciously like the ones he had felt when he had been a brat, freshly traumatized, sheltering him from the scent of the blood that had thickly tainted the walls.

Death had been one step too late; that yellow flash had gotten to him first.

* * *

"_Shit!_" someone was yelling; it didn't sound like any of the children.

"Yellow Flash!" someone else screamed.

He ignored them both.

The world fell away to polychromatic chaos as he flicked himself through the air, materializing, vanishing, _killing_. It was an easy enough process, one that the memory ingrained into his muscles was able to support even with a distinct lack of directions from the consciousness. Ibiki's kunai slid past the third throat, and lodged itself in the fourth. He surrendered himself to the winds when he heard a startled scream to the right, flashing in between the enemy ninja and Haruno Sakura, delivering a swift kick to the abdomen of the former. Plucking the kunai and shurikens from the girl's trembling fingers, he hurled the shurikens to position the Stone ninja into his line of movement and yanked his armed hand across the throat.

_Silence_.

One more left.

He made it a point to stroll, to _walk_, to the last of the Stone (Chuunin, he guessed), the kunai spinning lazily, slowly, around his index finger.

"You're supposed to be dead!" the Stone ninja suddenly blurted, taking desperate, backward steps. "We heard the story all the way up at our village, with you fighting the Nine-Tails, and... the Leaf's Yellow Flash was supposed to be dead!"

The kunai stopped spinning, the hilt meeting his palm with practiced precision. He lifted a finger to level it above his mouth over the mask, and the babbling stopped obediently.

"Yeah," he agreed at last, voice cutting through the silence, "He died, twelve years ago."

"No, you're right here! That information was a farce—"

"_No_," he snapped, with emotion raising the volume of his voice up a few notches. "He's dead."

The Stone Chuunin quieted, watching him with look of recognizable acquiescence as he steeled himself to ask, "What are you?"

He thought about maintaining his silence. He thought about it, decided against it, because what the hell—this bastard was going to die anyway. "They've referred to me as the Fourth's Legacy before."

"Legacy... huh?" the Chuunin said, lips turning upwards into a humorless smile, "Heh, this would have been some information to have reported back with. Even more valuable than that scroll, maybe."

"Maybe," he shrugged, "But you're not going to."

"I won't run. I'm not stupid. There isn't anyone in this world that can get away from you," the Chuunin said, an expression of dark amusement crossing his features. He held his head up high and met the quiet, churning killing intent within the violet eyes hidden partially behind the mask. "About the children... it was orders."

The cold fury in his belly lessened, weakened and compressed by understanding.

_It was orders._

He knew how that felt.

When the deed was done, six bodies lay on the ground, some dead, others in the process of dying. He closed his eyes as he threw the kunai into the dirt, impaling it deep into the sediment.

Behind him, Inuzuka Kiba whispered an awed, "_Fuck_."

Naruto stood still and victorious over the fallen bodies of the Stone ninjas, possessing little desire (or the energy) to answer the inquiring looks pressed against his back. He lifted his face up towards the darkened sky, and breathed in deep. It was only after the low buzz of excitement lowered itself an octave, back to baseline, that he allowed himself to be released from the effects of adrenaline, which had kept his muscles taught and instincts sharp.

_Breathe in. Breathe out. In. Out._

He hated the smell of blood.

Scrunching his nose, he finally turned to look at each of the children—sans Sasuke, whose form he carefully avoided looking at—and murmured, "Is anyone hurt?"

The only one with a pressing injury was Nara Shikamaru, who wore a gash on his right leg, from ankle to knee. He was leaning against Akimichi Chouji, regarding Naruto with a splintered expression of obvious relief and gratitude. Everyone else had only nasty sets of bruises and an array of cuts to worry about; a rather impressive feat from a group of Academy students placed against a group of Chuunins from the Stone during a time of peace. The girls were seated (huddled) together some distance away, while Aburame Shino stood by the Inuzuka's seated form, who was in turn tending to some of the injuries his puppy sidekick had acquired sometime during the battle.

Finally, someone—the Nara—spoke. "Thank you."

Naruto shook his head. "Back-up will be here in about fifteen minutes."

"Back up for _what?_" Inuzuka snorted, his eyes sweeping across the quieted battlefield. "Jeez, man. You... you _creamed_ them. Why didn't they send you from the beginning?"

A twitch of guilt stirred within his chest. Naruto wished the children could see his half-smile—it relayed his feelings on the matter with a type of ease that could not be replicated via words. He tried anyway. "I'm... sort of a last line of defense."

"Makes sense," Nara muttered.

"Are you okay, Shikamaru?" Akimichi asked.

"Should've been a _front _line of defense, fuck," Inzuka muttered. "Your paw okay now, Akamaru?"

Categorizing them all as _wounded _and _traumatized _but alive (will survive the journey back), he finally turned his attention to Sasuke.

The boy in question was using a tree to support himself, though still exactly where Naruto had left him, a hand braced against the bark with his head half-bowed in obvious display of exhaustion. His otherwise handsome features were twisted by the sour scowl he wore when he realized that he was under scrutiny, not at all pleased by something or another. Naruto would ask him later. But for now, he had to play the role dictated by the mask he wore.

"Can you walk?"

What he _really _wanted to ask was _are you alright? Are you hurt? Y__o__u idiot, why the hell did you freeze?!_ He forced a stopper on those thoughts, promising himself the right to scold Sasuke when they reached the village, back to safety, when Naruto was himself again. Even with those thoughts to quell the worst of the urges—to just rip off his mask and yank Sasuke into arms to make sure the boy was real, wasn't a pathetic figment of his imagination, and the real one was actually—_no._ No. Naruto gave into the impulse to shake his head, accepting Sasuke's resultant narrowing of eyes as a necessary sacrifice for the greater good of clearing his mind.

"Well?" he prompted.

"I'm fine," Sasuke said at last. His brows furrowed, thoughts warring across his expression, and looked up to utter the first syllable of Naruto's name before Naruto moved on, straightening his back to once more address the crowd. The children halted their low mumbles, quieting to observe him with subdued curiosity.

"We could wait for the back-up," he told them, "Or we can start walking back to the village."

There was a thoughtful silence before Inuzuka broke it with his mutter. "Shit, man. The sooner we get home, the better."

Slow agreement rumbled through the rest of them; Naruto nodded, having expected this, and approached the Nara and the Akimichi. Swooping down, he pulled his arm underneath the Nara boy's knees—careful not to jostle the damaged one—and held him up, bridal-style. Nara seemed stunned for a moment before his face took on a faint blush of mortification and turned his head away with a grumble.

"Sorry," Naruto said, without meaning it.

Nara narrowed his eyes at him, easily reading the amusement in his voice.

Akimichi just grinned. "Faster the better. Right, Shikamaru?"

"Whatever," Nara said with a sigh, "Today's been such a drag. I guess not having to walk is a good thing."

Not at all willing to allow the impending giggling to explode in the light of the Nara's new predicament, Naruto quickly took those words as consent, and began walking towards the path buried in between the trees, one that will lead them back to the village. Behind him, a flurry of movement ensued as the children scrambled up to follow him home.

* * *

Shikamaru looked like he was feeling much better, Sasuke mused dully with minimum interest. The boy lifted a hand in lazy greeting as he approached their group with languid steps, supported, once more, by Chouji.

There were marked improvements on the color of the face; the tint a little healthier than the deathly pale that Shikamaru had been sporting by the time they had reached the village. The bleeding had been almost uncontrollable, barely stopped by a few well-placed hits on the pressure points of his leg applied by Hinata midway. Their rescuer, the lone ANBU, had marched them into an unforgiving pace when Shikamaru had finally lost consciousness in his arms. None of them had been happy about it at the time, but he supposed seeing Shikamaru's healthier-looking, _living_ face eased away the irritation. Somewhat.

Sasuke gave Shikamaru a last look-over, and turned away with a low grunt.

"Hey man," Kiba grinned, "Fixed up already?"

Shikamaru yawned. "Sort of."

"They wanted him to stay at the hospital for the night," Chouji expanded. He shook his head. "But Hokage-sama summoned all of us, so..."

"What a pain," Shikamaru groaned. "I just wanted to go home and sleep."

By the shared expressions of sour exhaustion and aches, Sasuke deemed that statement to be mutual. They _all _wanted to go home, to nurse their cuts and bruises in a place of safety. The adrenaline hadn't quite released any of them; Kiba's hands were twitching in odd little intervals, Shino looked more rigid than usual, and Sakura was sitting up straighter, seemingly attentive, even when there was no need. Sasuke frowned; when had he begun to read his classmates' movements so easily?

"What do you think Hokage-sama wants us here for?" Ino was asking.

"Maybe he wants to check up on us?" Sakura offered.

"Hmph!" Ino snorted, "If he's so worried about us, he should have let us go home!"

"He probably wants us to explain what happened," Shikamaru said lazily. He nodded in thanks when Sakura inched over to give him room to sit at the edge of the bench when he had finally finished crossing the full length of the hallway. "How troublesome."

"Is it that important?" Kiba asked, an eyebrow rising, "I mean, that ANBU can explain everything, can't he?"

"It was a national emergency," Shikamaru answered. He clicked his tongue in annoyance. "Hokage-sama needs all the details he can get."

"I'd understand if Shikamaru was called," Chouji said between bites of his potato chips—where had he gotten that? Sasuke felt his stomach rouse in interest as the sound of chomping filled his ears. "But all of us?"

"Bastard, give me some!" Kiba demanded.

"Sure." Chouji held the bag out. "Just don't take the _last one_."

In response to Chouji's question, Ino grumbled out, "We'll find out soon, I guess."

And it had been in that lulling, comforting silence, that the door to the Hokage's door opened, releasing a string of Jounins—the back-up that the ANBU had spoken about—filtering out from the office with varying expressions of awe and amusement.

Upon entering the office, they stood, arranged in a horizontal line before the Hokage. The man looked older than usual, his pipe emitting soft smoke of a peculiar scent that Sasuke had long-since categorized, simply, as part of the Third's distinguishing characteristics. Unclasping his hands from behind his back, the Hokage lifted an aged hand to the pipe to lift it away from his lips.

"I am sorry," was how the Hokage began, much to the surprise of eight, "You have experienced something terrible tonight. You are the only ones who survived."

No one spoke. No one had to.

The Hokage went on. "However, I must also express my disappointment in you all."

Sasuke frowned. He caught sight of Kiba opening his mouth before it snapped closed under the baleful stare of the Hokage. Ino, standing to his left, tensed.

"You could have died, going out to fight _Chuunins_ without realizing their strengths, weaknesses, or if even when your support would be arriving. Luckily for all of you, that they—_he_—did. Just on time, I was told." Sasuke flushed a tad under the Hokage's stare, and stared stubbornly beyond the man at the window. "I expected you to have better judgments than this. You are mere students. The chances of your victory were slim, if it existed at all."

Surprisingly, it was Hinata that broke the rhythm of the Hokage's reprimand. "But... but Hokage-sama, we..."

"_Shush_," the Third said sternly, though his voice was not overly unkind. "I know. Your lives were in danger. It was a logical conclusion that another one of you might have been killed soon. But because of your actions, one of you were even forced to kill." A pause. "Who was it?"

"I—" Chouji began.

"I did," Shikamaru broke in. He gave a quick glance at Chouji, and the boy fell into a sullen silence.

The Hokage shook his head. "A lucky break, to be sure."

"Lucky?!" Kiba exploded at last, "It sure didn't look like luck from where I was sitting! Chou—er, Shikamaru was great—"

"There is nothing _great_," the Hokage murmured, "about having to kill."

Kiba flinched and fell back into silence.

"You must learn to pick your battles, to continue to take care of your teammates." The wording was odd. Sasuke looked up to the sight of the Hokage's frail smile, one that was tinted with no small amount of pride. "But no matter your lapses in judgments tonight, you are alive. I was told that your teamwork had been something worth applauding, and that is why you have all been promoted to the status of Genin."

"We were _what?__"_ Ino blurted.

The Hokage stepped aside to reveal the forehead protectors on his desk, arranged in two rows of four. He placed the pipe back in between his lips, and his smile stretched into something real, something more solid. "You are all Genins. True Genins. Did you know that, upon Academy graduation, you are to be placed in three-man cells with a Jounin Instructor?" All nodded. The Hokage went on, "However, _graduation _only makes you _eligible _to the status of Genin."

"So there was going to be an extra test?" Sakura asked, incredulous. "Would... would the Instructors have failed some of us...?"

"More than _some _of you," the Hokage chuckled, "Sixty-six percent of you would have failed."

"_What?!_" Kiba exclaimed.

"They are tests to test you to see if you have fully grasped the most important aspect of being a Genin," was the continued explanation; the Hokage seemed to have grown a quick immunity to the volume and intensity of Kiba's shouts. "Can any of you tell me what that might be, with your experiences kept in mind?"

"Teamwork." The word left his mouth on its own accord, faster and more confidently spoken than anybody else. Sasuke wanted to know why _exactly_ that _everyone _seemed to stare at him with a doubled amount of intensity whenever he spoke tonight; he had said more than Shino, and the content of his words were never ridiculous. He glared at them all, and stubbornly went on. "We all knew fighting alone would get us killed."

Grins broke out on the faces of the remaining seven, and the rest filled in.

"We watched each other's back."

"Kept each other alive."

It didn't matter who spoke those words; those contents were of things they _all _understood, now with ease.

The Hokage gave Sasuke a lasting stare before he nodded. "If you understand, then there is nothing left for me to say. Come. These forehead protectors belong to you."

"You first, Shikamaru," Ino said. She grinned. "You and Chouji."

Shikamaru raised an eyebrow. When no one stepped in to argue Ino's declaration, he sighed, and with a mutter under his breath, he moved forward with the Chouji's aid. He reached out, accepted the forehead protector that the Hokage handed him, only to immediately pass it onto Chouji. The words were left unsaid as Shikamaru accepted the second forehead protector as his own, and the rest of them followed, with Sasuke at the end of the line.

"From this moment forward, you are all Genins of the Leaf. Wear your forehead protectors with pride," the Hokage announced, smiling at their pleased expressions. "Now, I will announce your three-man Genin teams. Team One—Inuzuka Kiba, Aburame Shino, and Hyuuga Hinata."

"Yo, teammates," Kiba greeted, his grin all teeth, "Let's get along."

"Team Two—Yamanaka Ino, Nara Shikamaru, and Akimichi Chouji."

"You know, before all this, I thought you were just some lazy no-name guy," Ino declared at Shikamaru, "That's one good thing out of all this, huh? Now I know better."

"I still think you're too loud," Shikamaru deadpanned.

"Ino," the Hokage sighed, tiredly shaking his head, "Please do not injure Shikamaru any more than what he has already suffered. Now, finally, for Team Three..."

"One moment, Hokage-sama!" Sakura interrupted. "I... I know I'm with Sasuke-kun—" She gave off a giggle then, her eyes darting in Sasuke's general direction. Sasuke disregarded her attentions in favor of cursing the Hokage. Why, of all the seven, had he been stuck with _Sakura? _Wincing at his blatant disinterest, she trekked forward, "Um, but... wouldn't that only leave us with a team of two...?"

"Well," Ino whistled, "That'd be good for _you_, Sakura."

"Shut up, Ino!" Sakura placed both hands over her face, and emitted an embarrassed mumble that Sasuke didn't care enough to catch. He closed his eyes, also pointedly ignoring the pitied looked thrown his way from Kiba and Shikamaru, wondering where the kunoichi of passable skills had gone off and died to replace her with the usual Sakura from the Academy. She was going to hold him back—_get them both killed_—if she didn't sober up and face the situation as it were. It wasn't a game; hadn't she learned this from what she had experienced tonight? Definitely something worth mentioning whenever he got the chance, though preferably at a time when she wasn't busily emulating a banshee.

Oblivious to Sasuke's misery, the Hokage chuckled, and exhaled an impressive lungful of smoke. "Sakura. You do not need to worry. It will be a three-man team."

Sasuke thanked him silently as Sakura's face fell.

"May I go on?" The Hokage lifted an eyebrow to accentuate his question as he gazed at Sakura, who answered with a blush and nod. "Then. For the final team, Team Three—Uchiha Sasuke, Haruno Sakura—"

The door swung open, and a man—their lone ANBU, the one that slit six throats within five minutes with only two kunais and several shurikens as his entire artillery—walked into the office. Everyone turned to stare at the man in morbid curiosity as a hand reached up to remove the mask in perfect harmony with the Hokage's pace and words. "—and Uzumaki Naruto."

Naruto held the mask in one hand, and lifted the other in greeting. He grinned. "Yo."

Sasuke's jaw slackened in shock.

* * *

Obvious changes from the canon verse (namely Ino's lack of interest in Sasuke & her undamaged friendship with Sakura so far) will all be explained in due time. All comments, constructive criticism, and questions welcomed.

Thanks for reading!


	2. chapter two: prelude to chaos

**Summary:** 22-year-old Naruto hadn't really been thinking when he had asked for guardianship over Uchiha Sasuke, five years ago. But now that Sasuke was a ninja, Naruto finds he has little choice but to come out of retirement to keep Sasuke in line. [AU, no pairings.]

**Disclaimer:** I do not own Naruto.

* * *

**Jacksonian March**

chapter two

_prelude to chaos_

* * *

To be honest, Naruto had expected more of a _bang _in the children's reaction to his unmasking. They had taken to his identity _far _better than Naruto had given them credit for. Sure, the Inuzuka kid may have yelled a little, and the Nara had looked as if he had already known (he probably had, the little bastard), but the rest of them had just stared. Ino's stare had quickly turned into a shy smile after her initial shock had worn off, and Sasuke's had turned more and more deadly with every passing second. It had been as if the kid had been trying to commit homicide with the sheer strength of his glare.

Naruto had to try very, _very _hard not to roll his eyes.

The questions had come next (mostly from the Inuzuka), but the old man had (thankfully) stepped in then, silencing them with the authority that only the Hokage was allowed to wield.

"You will have plenty of time for questions tomorrow," the Hokage had said.

After that, it had been but a matter of formality: going over the rest of the basics of being Genin, and a short run-down of how things were going to work tomorrow. They would all gather at training ground seven at eight o'clock whereupon the three teams would meet their assigned Jounin instructors.

"You are all dismissed," the Hokage concluded, "Rest up, and remember to wear your forehead protectors with pride. Naruto, a word."

Naruto nodded, making himself comfortable against a wall as the children filtered out of the room, all of them casting him a curious glance as they passed. Sasuke was the only one that did not look up, face shadowed by a glower. He slammed the door closed a little harder than necessary when he, the last of the eight, made his exit. Naruto winced, but forced himself to wait until the sound of footsteps were well faded from the hallway behind the door and walls before clearing his throat.

"What's up, old man?"

* * *

Bone-jarring exhaustion was all that he could feel when the first thing that he saw upon exiting the Hokage's office was the stern face of Morino Ibiki. Naruto tried not to sigh too loudly as he rubbed at his face, running a hand through his hair, disappointed that this nightmare's ordeals were not yet over. Ibiki's presence was proof enough for that claim. He grimaced, but closed the door to the office behind him softly, without malice, deciding to accept this predicament without the exertion of energy that he no longer had.

"No complaints?" Ibiki asked mildly, pushing away from the wall that he had been standing against.

"You're kidding me, right?" Naruto asked incredulously, "I got _so_ many that I don't know where to start. Ugh. What do you want _now?_"

Ibiki did not answer. Hands going into his pockets, he turned away and began walking, leaving only a silent command to follow in his wake. Naruto mumbled something rude under his breath but obeyed, taking a few quick strides to fall into step with the larger man.

It wasn't until Naruto was breathing in the cool night air into his lungs that Ibiki finally informed him of their destination.

"I am escorting you to the hospital."

"I don't need no _escort_," Naruto scowled. He paused, and then added, "And what do I have to go to the hospital for? I'm not hurt."

"I'm aware," Ibiki answered, casting him an amused, sideways glance. "But even when setting aside the fact that you are out of shape—" Naruto twitched. "—you are still far more tired than you should be."

"Stop picking on me," Naruto grumbled, "It's just been a long day, okay?"

"Of course," Ibiki agreed.

A moment of terse silence later, a thought suddenly struck Naruto. "I didn't screw up _too _bad, right?" he blurted. When one of Ibiki's eyebrows rose in interest, he went on, "It's about... you know, killing all of them. Just remembered I probably should've left one alive or... something."

Ibiki was quiet for a moment, and then gave Naruto a short nod. "That is the usual protocol, yes."

"I'm sorry," Naruto said honestly, "It's just, I wasn't really—"

"What's done is done. Making excuses is unbecoming, Uzumaki," Ibiki interjected. His tone was sharp and chastising. "If you require the reminder, your primary mission was to rescue the children."

Naruto sighed and nodded. Of course he knew that. Rescuing the children—_Sasuke_—had been the _only _reason that he had agreed to the mission in the first place. He closed his eyes briefly as another wave of exhaustion surged up from inside, the force of which almost buckled his knees to send him crashing to the ground. Probably would have, had Ibiki not seen the signs to quickly grip at Naruto's upper arm, holding him up mercilessly until the remnants of strength returned to Naruto's legs. Naruto shook off the grip, feeling more than a _little_ mortified at his current state, though he remembered his manners enough to mutter a low thanks after a prolonged, _very awkward _moment.

Maybe paying a visit to the hospital wasn't _that _bad of an idea. It had been a long time since he had last expended such vast amounts of chakra, and he felt it. Physical aches and pains couldn't even _begin _to compare to the type of incapacitation that chakra exhaustion tended to dole out. If a single day of returning to the ninja profession had flipped his entire life onto its back, he was going to need all the energy he could spare to face the months (and probably _years_) that was now set before him.

"So what now? Another war?" he asked quietly. He'd neither be surprised nor entirely against the idea— those Stone bastards had taken _children _hostage, after all. Had killed them as though they were livestock. In fact, it'd be _more _of a surprise if the _Leaf _wasn't the one clamoring for revenge.

"No," Ibiki answered, his voice just as quiet. Naruto released the breath that he had been unwittingly holding. "Those Chuunins will most likely be declared as missing-nins by their village, if they haven't been already. And as it stands, we do not have enough evidence to refute that claim. So there will be no war, just tension." A crooked smile twisted at his scarred features. "Though it would have been a different story if you had left one alive."

Naruto blinked, and allowed a small smile to stretch his lips.

Professionally, he knew it was pathetic to forget the rules and procedures that had been drilled into him ever since he had been able to read. Ninjas were not paid to feel; they were taught to make decisions based on logic even in the direst of consequences. But Naruto had never been very good at that area of study; never have been, never will be. Now, he was rather glad for it.

The blossoming of a war right before his eyes was something he definitely did not want to see twice, no matter what. They could take revenge on the Stone some other way, and Naruto had a suspicion that the number of Stone's clientele would be dropping in the near future anyway; killers of children—_civilian_ children for all intents and purposes—were sponsored only by the deranged, and there weren't _that _many of those types of people in the world, despite popular opinion.

"We can only hope that the Stone wishes to maintain the peace as much as the Leaf does," Ibiki was continuing. The lines around his eyes hardened a little. "However, if something to this scale happens again, a war is likely to become the final outcome."

"Well, even if it comes to that, at least you've got me now," Naruto said cheekily, attempting to lighten the mood.

The larger man snorted immediately, and while that reaction made Naruto scowl, the man's next words didn't. "That we do."

Feeling both pleased and mortified at the man's confidence, Naruto fell into silence even after the white building of the hospital was well into their line of vision and Ibiki bade him a good night.

* * *

"The seal's fine," Rin said, drawing back after giving Naruto's stomach one last probing poke.

Naruto drew his shirt back down, attempting to peer at the notes that she was scribbling down before his efforts were forcefully aborted by a firm look. He sat back, leaning away with a pout as he threaded his fingers behind his head. "What about the old man Hokage's?"

"_Hokage-sama's_ addition," Rin corrected firmly, "Also looks fine."

"Good, good. Thanks, Rin," Naruto grinned.

"Don't mention it," she smiled back. Turning her pen onto a smaller pad of paper, she continued, "I'm still going to give you a prescription of chakra replenishers, though. You should be fine after a good night's rest, but just in case."

Naruto accepted the prescription note without complaint, folding it in half once before tucking it into the pocket of his pants.

"Are you sure that you don't want me to ease it a little bit?" Rin asked when Naruto drew himself onto his feet. She looked at him, worry etched between her eyebrows. "It's because of Hokage-sama's seal that your chakra reserves are so small, you know?"

"Yeah, I know," Naruto shrugged.

"Naruto..."

"It's a price worth paying," he said firmly.

Much to Naruto's relief, she seemed to concede without further argument with a sight. "Just be careful," she said, "I would tell you not to use _Hirameku_, but that's all you're good at. Remember, no more than ten."

"Why's everyone picking on me today?" Naruto grumbled, scrunching up his nose in a half-scowl.

Rin's expression softened as she also rose to her feet, a hand reaching out to rest gently on Naruto's elbow. He tried not to flinch. "We're just worried."

After a moment of consideration, he rested a hand over hers. "And I'm saying you worry too much. Jeez, lighten up already."

"Naruto," Rin said sternly, frowning a little, "Don't you think you're taking this a little _too_ lightly?"

Naruto gave her hand a reassuring pat before finally giving in to the desire to shy away from the touch. "I'm not, I swear."

"Alright," Rin said after some length, seemingly unaffected by him shying away from contact. But of course she wouldn't be; this was _Rin_. "But give me that promise, Naruto. No more than ten."

"I promise," Naruto said seriously. He gave her a smile—a genuine one that did not hide his eyes behind a toothy grin—that she returned with sisterly affection. Waving the prescription around in the air, he added, "So, uh, even _with _the Hokage's seals, you know I need about five times as much for these to work fully, right? Per dose?"

"Of course I do," Rin said, raising an eyebrow, "Who's the med-nin here? I gave you the amount that I felt you'd need, but come find me if you think you need more." She paused. "Come to my apartment, actually. I'll be on leave starting tomorrow."

"You are?" Naruto blinked, staring. That was unexpected. Rin rarely took breaks unless it was health related or— _holy shit_. It couldn't be. "Are you pregn—"

He didn't get to finish that sentence as a clipboard came flying out of nowhere at mach speed to sandwich itself against his face.

"_Ow_, shit!"

"I'm feeling perfectly fine, thank you for asking," Rin said sweetly, drawing back her throwing arm. "As for my leave, it's for an assignment, Naruto. I still have to take on a Genin team, and this felt to be a good time as any."

Naruto rubbed at his reddening nose. "My team?" he asked, the words slightly congested from the lingering pain.

"Unfortunately not," Rin said a little regretfully. "But you know there's really only one person who can be a Jounin sensei to both you and Uchiha Sasuke."

"Yeah, I know," Naruto sighed. He gave his nose another rub, and then bent down to pick up the clipboard to hand it back to Rin. He was choosing not to hold that blow against her; he kind of deserved it, after all. "Well, they're all good kids, so you'll enjoy this rotation, I think."

"Thanks," Rin said, accepting the clipboard. "And that's what I'm hoping. At least I don't have to give that bell test this time around."

Naruto smiled in sympathy. Ah, that infamous bell test. "Anyway, do you think you can tell me what room Iruka's in? I'm already here, so might as well go punch him awake or something."

Rin's smile dropped into a frown. "He's not in the best of states right now—"

"An hour," Naruto cut in quickly. "Or thirty minutes. Fifteen. Ten! I swear I won't stay long. I just need to see him and make sure he's alright." _With my own two eyes._

Rin sighed and pinched the bridge of her nose. But when she sat back down to return to her paperwork, there was a line of acquiescence to her shoulders that had Naruto silently cheering in victory. Sure enough, Rin soon supplied: "Room 213. Remember that he's a _patient_, Naruto. If I find you still in there after thirty minutes, I'm kicking you out. Starting now, by the way."

He didn't need to be told twice.

* * *

Naruto felt his hands curl tightly into fists as he monitored the extent of Iruka's injuries with a tight expression.

In short, his best friend looked like shit.

It had taken the entirety of two seconds after his departure from Rin's care to find his way to Iruka's bedside. He hadn't bothered to turn on the lights when he had entered room 213; the dark never bothered his sight, and Iruka was a ninja—such a blatant disturbance in the environment would most definitely wake him, wounded or not. That was, of course, unless he was hurt to the point of being rendered incompetent or comatose.

Naruto gave that line of logic some thought, and promptly strolled over to the light switch, flicking them on.

He held his breath through the moment of silence that followed his actions, only remembering to exhale when Iruka groaned from where he was disabled on the bed.

"Naruto?" Iruka's voice was thick with pain and irritation. "What are you—will you turn that _off?_"

With a small grin, Naruto did as he was asked, and replanted himself on the only chair in the room by the bed. He peered at Iruka's face with interest, feeling only a smidgen of guilt at the pinched expression. Propping an elbow on the bed, he rested his chin on the hand, keeping his gaze fixed on his friend.

"Ibiki-san made me come here," Naruto said in a way of explanation, keeping his voice low out as not to aggravate Iruka's obvious headache any more than necessary, "And since I heard you got your ass landed here too, I decided to pay you a visit."

"Yes, thank you," Iruka grumbled, shakily pressing a hand to his forehead. He sighed in a long-suffering manner before prying one eye open to meet Naruto's gaze. "... wait, you were hurt?"

"Huh? Oh, nah." Naruto waved that worry off dismissively. "Just in case, yeah? Just in case."

Iruka simply stared at him for a moment, the movement slow and laboured, before simply closing his eye again. "Okay. You lost me."

"Sorry," Naruto said, leaning away from the bed and into the backrest of his chair, "Man, where do I even start..."

"From the beginning?" Iruka said hopefully.

"Right, right," Naruto nodded. Pressing his lips into a thin line for a moment, he began speaking, retelling the day's events as best as he remembered it, carefully sticking to the facts. From Mizuki's capture, to the Stone's demands, the systematic slaughter of the Academy children, and finally, the rescue of those who had survived. Naruto purposefully left out his role in the story, having decided that he wanted to break _that _particular piece of news separately.

An uncomfortable silence settled between them when Naruto finished talking. Iruka seemed unhurried to respond, and Naruto almost wished that Iruka had fallen unconscious throughout his soliloquy. _Almost_, because Iruka, as the instructor of the kidnapped class, would undoubtedly be debriefed by the old man Hokage tomorrow morning anyway. Even if Naruto had kept to his silence, he would have only spared Iruka an extra day. More than that, the first thing the old man would tell Iruka would be Naruto's reinstated status as Genin, and Naruto wanted to be the one to break that to his friend. Once he figured out how.

"Sorry, Naruto," Iruka finally said, his voice thick with emotion, "Just... just give me a moment."

Naruto nodded despite the fact that Iruka could not see it, unwilling to speak for he knew that no words in the world could ease the blow. His singular focus on securing Sasuke's safety and the absurdity with which he had viewed the notion that _Chuunins_ had attempted to frighten a _ninja _village into compliance by killing off children-hostages had numbed him to the Stone's actions up until he saw the look of anguish that overtook Iruka's face. He felt angrier than he did sad, more hate than he did sorrow.

_It was orders_.

Still, hearing those words had dissipated the emotions in Naruto, easing him through the emotional roller coaster and brought him back down to the ground. Unfortunately, Iruka had no such buffer, and Naruto found himself having to look away as Iruka worked himself through the many stages of grief and anger in a matter of minutes (like he was trained to do, like _Naruto _had been trained to do), while berating himself of—

Of what, exactly?

He hadn't been debriefed of the situation until even the old man Hokage (who had supported his early retirement for _ten years_) had deemed it to be an emergency enough to recruit his help to resolve the conflict. There was nothing that he could have done differently to reduce the number of causalities. Nothing, perhaps, except his choice to give up his ninja status ten years ago.

"—Sasuke?" Iruka was saying.

"What?" Naruto blinked, shoving the rest of his thoughts away.

"What about Sasuke?" Iruka repeated.

Naruto resisted the urge to roll his eyes in a mixture of exasperation and friendly affection. Trust Iruka to cope by worrying about someone else.

"He's okay," Naruto told Iruka. "The kid's got crazy luck, I'm telling you."

Iruka nodded without necessarily looking like he agreed or even comprehended Naruto's words.

After a moment's hesitation, Naruto mumbled, "There's, uh, one more thing."

"Mm?" Iruka murmured, subdued.

"I'm a ninja again," Naruto said quietly.

Iruka opened his eyes again slowly, and alongside the surprise Naruto had been expecting, there was a dull glow of understanding. "... you rescued them?"

"The ones I could," Naruto nodded. _The ones still alive_.

There was a quiet exhale of breath, and Naruto had been half-way through an uncertain fidget before Iruka finally spoke. "Thank you."

"I could only save eight," Naruto reminded him, and winced.

"Better than none," Iruka countered gently. "Anyone other than you... they wouldn't have made it. You know that, right? You can be stupid, but not _that _stupid."

"Hey," Naruto frowned. Seriously, why was everyone insulting him today?

"How many times?" Iruka asked idly.

"Of what?"

Iruka fixed him a look. "Of _Hirameku._"

"Six?" Naruto guessed after a brief pause to count. He grinned. "Heh! Four shy of the limit. Pretty good for a rusty ninja like me, hey?"

"Don't get cocky," Iruka grunted with a roll of his eyes. He tilted his head so that he could properly meet Naruto's gaze, his expression twisted itself with honest worry. "Naruto... about the ninja thing. Are you sure you're okay with it?"

Naruto felt himself smile a little wryly. "It's not like I have a choice, so I don't really know yet," he confessed, willing his voice to sound as honest as he felt. These words would be for Iruka and Iruka only, because Iruka had been the first (and, once upon a time, the _only_) person to still acknowledge him as _human_ after the disaster of ten years ago. He owed it to his friend. "But I will be. I have to be."

Iruka's gaze was searching and assessing, but not judgmental. Then, after a while, he gave a nod and smiled. There was something akin to cautious optimism underlining his next words in true Iruka-style, feeling it for the both of them. "Yeah. You always do pull through in the end. But look at it this way, if it helps: you have a steady source of income now."

Naruto laughed, bright and genuine. "There _is _that, yeah! Gama-chan has been looking a little thin lately."

"Ah, the wonders of raising a kid," Iruka said, his tone sliding just a pinch into mocking.

"Don't start," Naruto warned him, pointing a finger at Iruka's face, "_You're _the one that willingly signed up to deal with more brats than you can actually handle as your job."

"Just wait 'til puberty," Iruka said, gamely ignoring Naruto's jab, "That's when the fun _really _starts."

"Says you," Naruto sniffed, "Puberty won't be any more different than how Sasuke is now. He's a little bastard twenty four-seven!"

_Serves you right_, Naruto crowed gleefully but silently when Iruka laughed himself right into fits of pained wheezing. He leaned back into his chair while Iruka fought to compose himself, grinning while thinking _yeah_—things were going to be okay. He would _make_ it okay.

* * *

It was weird, Sasuke noted with no little amount of disgust, to come back home—_Naruto's apartment_, he corrected himself vehemently—without having a blond moron round up on him immediately after he had opened the door. The smell of ramen, while having been long-since been imbedded into the walls, wasn't as fresh. Even the bright colors of the walls (walls he had helped paint three years ago, in a shade of orange that had thankfully dulled over time) did not seem as appalling as usual. There was no _welcome back_ to answer back to, no need to say _I'm home_.

What was most disconcerting, however, was how _irritated _Sasuke felt at the deathly silence that met him when he twisted his copy of the key into the doorknob to enter the apartment. It had been a long time (nearly five years) since he had to return to a silent home with only his thoughts and memories to greet him.

He hadn't wanted to admit it, but somewhere along the line, he had gotten rather comfortable around the idiot's boisterous energy. He wasn't used to being alone at night with only his vows of vengeance for company. Not anymore. And all of this was _that idiot's fault_.

Sasuke tried not to snarl as he ripped off his sandals, and decided that it was better not to think tonight. Instead, he quietly roamed the empty apartment. Despite having lived here for (almost) five years, the place suddenly felt strangely alien and _new_. It was smaller than Sasuke ever remembered the place being. He could barely call it even modest in size. He tried very hard to convince himself that that might actually have to do with the boxes still tucked against the corner of the living room, stacked upward against the walls rather than the lack of Naruto's presence.

The kitchen was the only place that did not suffer the shrinking effect; it was always the busiest area of the apartment, second only to the bathroom in the morning (when both he and Naruto were fighting for the shower). The hallway that connected the living room and kitchen seemed much more constricted in comparison. The distance between his room and the bathroom had always been two short steps, but tonight made those steps feel even smaller.

Sasuke hissed at these observations, feeling even more frustrated than when he had first stepped into the apartment.

He changed tactics, decidedly turning his introspective on himself. He gauged his body's damage and fatigue, and found that while he was exhausted, his mind was alert (_too _alert). It was alert enough to warn him that if he slept now, before Naruto returned, he would probably lose the only chance to confront the blond about—well, everything. And right now, he needed answers more than he needed rest.

That was the reason why he found himself turning away from his bedroom door to face Naruto's. Sasuke reached out to grasp the doorknob to twist it (he was half-surprised that it wasn't locked), and pushed the door open.

He had never been in Naruto's room before. He hadn't even gotten a _glimpse _in the five years he had been living with the man. It was stranger still that it had felt entirely _normal_ to know absolutely nothing about Naruto just yesterday when all he could feel was irritation at such a thought today.

Sasuke set his jaw, narrowed his eyes, and stepped into the room, flicking on the light as he did so.

The room was boring. Suspiciously so. He inspected the room from the doorway again and again, feeling reluctant to enter the room without a justifiable reason. He finally found one when his eyes landed on the pillow and the corner of what he thought to be a piece of paper peeking out from underneath. Zeroing in on the discovery, he ventured forward to be able to pull the picture—picture_s_, he soon realized, three of them—from below the pillow.

The first warmed his cheeks slightly. It was a picture of Naruto and himself from five years ago, when Naruto had become his official guardian. He quickly moved that to the back. The second featured a Naruto that seemed to be a little younger than his own age, standing with two other children and a man clad in the typical Jounin attire. He couldn't recognize any of the other inhabitants of the picture. Either they were no more than average ninjas not worth noting, or they were dead. Considering the level of Naruto's skill that he had seen firsthand tonight, the latter explanation was probably the right one.

Dead, then. It didn't surprise him really; it would be just like Naruto to keep a picture of his (deceased) Genin team.

Sasuke stared at Naruto's younger face, feeling like he was observing some great secret that he could not consciously grasp. He peered at the youthful version of Naruto's face a little harder, willing the lifeless picture to relinquish its secrets when a knock captured his attention. He jumped a little, and glanced cautiously in the direction of the noise.

It was Naruto, standing in the doorway of his room, looking both amused and exasperated at once.

"Couldn't wait, huh?" Naruto asked, sounding uncharacteristically patient. The door closed behind him with an ominous _click_. "Okay. Let's talk, Sasuke."

Finding no escape from the impending situation, Sasuke found himself unable to do anything else but nod.

* * *

After a moment's consideration, Naruto decided to open his window for fresh air; he had a feeling that he'd be needing it. When he turned back around to face Sasuke, the kid was already on the other side of the room, back pressed against the wall. Both his body posture and gaze spoke volumes of his apprehension, making Naruto sigh and ran a hand through his hair tiredly.

Well, best to get this over with.

Nodding to the pictures still clutched in Sasuke's hand, he asked, "Can I have those back?"

Sasuke did not react immediately, but eventually unwound enough to step away from the wall momentarily to hand Naruto the pictures. He then returned to his original position, his body language still tense and taut with the expectation of a reprimand.

Naruto couldn't entirely refute the kid's suspicions; looking down at the pictures, he _did _want to give Sasuke an earful for breaching his privacy. But that would most likely push the impending conversation off a cliff, ultimately meaning that both parties would be going to bed in a foul mood. And that was the _last _thing that Naruto wanted tonight. He sighed again, and went about to seat himself on his bed.

Then, instead of indulging his irritation to chastise Sasuke, he smiled. It wasn't a wide smile, not one of his trademark grins. It was smaller. It was more controlled, mature. He gave himself a pat on the back for it, and allowed himself to feel a vicious pinch of pride when Sasuke's expression faltered, obviously not having expected such a reaction.

"It's my first Genin team," Naruto said mildly, looking down at the picture on top—the one where he was younger, stupider, full of impossible dreams—with his lips drawn thin. "I don't remember how long ago it was, actually. Probably a little younger than you, though."

Sasuke didn't answer, but the air was heavy with his attention.

"So yeah, I was a ninja before," Naruto went on, "But I had to stop."

"What happened?" Sasuke asked after a moment.

"It's a long story," Naruto replied, his voice coming out drier than he had originally intended, "But the important thing is that something went bad. Like, _really _bad. And, well, nobody would've wanted to keep going after that."

It wasn't an answer that Sasuke seemed to be pleased with, but it was answer enough for him to move onto a different topic. The kid was curious, but he preferred to keep his nose out of others' businesses (_most _of the time). Made sense, considering the amount of skeletons he had in his own closet. "Then what about tonight?"

"The Genin thing?"

Sasuke inclined his head once in confirmation.

"It's called blackmail." The corner of his smile kicked up to give the entire thing a bitter touch. "Some of the top guys didn't really like it that I just... you know, quit. They've been after this for years. They probably talked the old man Hokage into making me a ninja again if I went to you guys' rescues tonight."

Jaws clenched, Sasuke bit out, "It's our fault, then."

"No," Naruto said sharply, "It's that bastard, Mizuki's. Listen, Sasuke—" He set the pictures away to the side to lean forward, elbows braced against his knees as he laced his fingers together tightly. "It's not like I expected it to go on forever, you know? You guys did a really good job out there. Even if it was really stupid."

"You were better," Sasuke said sourly, "And you're just a Genin." _Like me._

Both of Naruto's eyebrows shot up. "Is _that _what's bothering you? Out of everything?"

The lack of a response was response enough for Naruto. He rolled his eyes. "_Sasuke_," he admonished, exasperated, "Of _course _I'm better. I'm older. _And _I'm the Great Uzumaki Naruto. It'll be decades before you can even _begin _to catch up to me."

Sasuke's eyes flashed. Naruto bit down a smile; now _that_ was more like it.

"In your dreams, dead-last," Sasuke snorted, "It'd only take me a few days."

Naruto's eyes shone with amusement. "Oh yeah? Wanna bet? And don't call me that."

Sasuke unwound his arms and shoved his hands into the pockets of his pants; it was a habit of Sasuke's that Naruto had long-since begun to associate with both interest and confidence with a little bit of tension wedged in between. "How much are you willing to lose?"

"Ha ha." Naruto pursed his lips in thought. "Well, I'm feeling a little generous tonight. How about I let youpick?"

"You're just out of ideas," Sasuke accused. Naruto winced when the words hit true, but the reaction went unnoticed as clouds of thoughts began to darken the Uchiha's features.

Naruto frowned. "Oi, not a kidney or anything like that, alright?"

Sasuke did not answer, apparently too lost in his thoughts to be even listening.

Naruto rolled his eyes, but let the kid have his silence. He had too many thoughts buzzing around in his head to be bored by the standstill anyway.

_"It's been a while. You look well, Naruto."_

Honestly, he hadn't expected his private meeting with the Hokage to last as long as it had. Maybe it was because he had been prepared for the wrong things. He had been expecting to talk about business, about his reinstatement as Genin and what that would entail. He had expected to be told, to be _warned,_ that his every move, every breath, would be watched. He had been prepared to be told that the members of the council viewed him as his father's son, both a weapon and a threat to the village. He had been prepared to listen to all the gritty politics that he _knew _would surround him the moment he took a step back into this world.

But the Hokage hadn't spoken on any of those things.

_"I've heard a considerable amount of gossip involving you. Still can't keep yourself out of trouble, hm?"_

No, the old man had kept to a relatively lighter conversation. He had asked after how Naruto was eating, if the nightmares had returned at all, how he was getting along with Sasuke. Nothing out of the old man's mouth had been about business; everything had been personal.

It had been a long time. A long, _long _time since Naruto had last enjoyed such a conversation. No one else would speak with him about such things, if only because no one else knew Naruto like the old man did. Not even Iruka. Not that anyone else would know how to approach him even if they _did _know; the Nine-Tails was not exactly a chummy topic to be had over dinner, after all.

"A favour," Sasuke said at last.

He had actually been half-asleep when Sasuke's voice suddenly cut through the haze, attaining all of his attention as anything Sasuke-related typically did. Mind a little befuddled by drowsiness, it took several seconds before Naruto successfully found his voice again. "Eh?"

"The bet," Sasuke reminded him, strangely tolerant, "You owe me a favour when I win."

"_If_ you win." Naruto forced himself to pause to gather his thoughts, still a little disorientated. "Wait, you took that long to think of something like _that?_"

"Is the bet on or not?" Sasuke asked impatiently.

Naruto grunted in irritation, but decided to humour him. If Sasuke had taken _this _long to come to a conclusion as simple as a favour, then the kid probably had something _big _planned. Something, Naruto thought tiredly, possibly (very) bad. "What sort of favour are we talking here?"

Sasuke's expression was flat, his voice was even flatter. "That's my business."

"It'll be my business too if you win somehow. Not that it'll ever happen, but I'm gonna cover all my bases, just in case," Naruto said, "So spill, Sasuke."

"You're scared," Sasuke accused.

Naruto's lips curled, realizing that Sasuke had no intention of sharing his thoughts. Thankfully, specifics were not crucial to Naruto's worries; there were ways around Sasuke's tight-lipped secret. "I'm not going to kill for you. Or do anything that'll land your ass in prison—or worse."

Sasuke looked torn between looking agitated and amused. "Why not? You have no problems killing."

"That's different. Someone _else _tells me who to kill. It's my job. And now, yours too," Naruto countered. Naruto was going to think on the ramifications of _that _particular piece of reality later. Preferably after at _least _six hours of sleep. "But this seems a little more personal. I'm serious, Sasuke; I won't do it."

Inhaling a noisy breath, Sasuke met his eyes squarely. "You won't need to."

"Promise? You can give me your word?"

"Yes."

Letting out a soft huff, Naruto ignored his body's protests and forced himself to sit upright. "Fine. Then how about we have a spar when you turn Jounin, and—"

"Chuunin," Sasuke cut in, "When I turn Chuunin."

Naruto shot him an incredulous look. "What, are you _trying _to lose? Jounin."

"Chuunin," Sasuke repeated stubbornly.

"No, Jounin."

"_Chuunin._"

As much as he might argue, Naruto knew that Sasuke had already won this round; Sasuke had won the moment that hard glint had entered those black eyes. Naruto was entirely familiar with the stubbornness that seemed to run in the veins of the Uchiha, knew very well that it was futile when one of them made up their minds like Sasuke had done just now. While he might have put up a better resistance any other day, tonight was _not _just any other day—he was at a clear disadvantage, and one of the first lessons in being a good ninja was the ability to cut your losses to move on.

Naruto sighed, and shook his head, pointedly ignoring the look of triumph that Sasuke's face immediately became awash with. "You're going to regret this," he told the kid, "Don't whine and try to change your mind later on, got it?"

Sasuke cast him a _look_.

"Well, okay," Naruto shrugged, "Then when you turn _Chuunin_, we'll have a spar. If you win, I owe you favour. Anything you want, other than killing and the general... creepy stuff."

"Anything," Sasuke confirmed, "_And _everything."

"Greedy bastard," Naruto grinned ruefully.

"And you're a moron." Sasuke matched his expression, lips kicking up a few millimetres in his version of a smile. "What else is new?"

"Bah." Too tired to make a proper retort, Naruto forced his body backwards so that it fell onto the mattress. His bed had never felt so soft, so welcoming. "Just know that when I win, I'm gonna have you buy me Ichiraku until you _die_, Uchiha."

"Somehow, I'm not worried."

"Ass," Naruto said good-naturedly, closing his eyes without meaning to. "Hey, Sasuke?"

The soft noise of footsteps stopped, and Sasuke's voice carried over from where Naruto suspected to be the doorway of his room. "What?"

"Don't compare yourself to me," Naruto said softly, just loud enough to be heard, "I'm not a good measuring stick, and you don't want to be like me. Ever."

Sasuke was silent for a long, hard moment, making Naruto wonder briefly if the kid had heard him at all, before an equally quiet snort sounded. "As if anyone would want to be like _you_."

The kid left afterward, taking it upon himself to flip off the lights and closing the door.

He hadn't said all that he wanted to say, but he figured that this was not a bad finale to the most rotten day of the decade. And if Naruto had learned anything from his twenty-two years, it was to take what you can get.

* * *

**Notes:** All comments, constructive criticism, and questions welcomed. Thanks for reading!


	3. chapter three: stitching on the pattern

**Summary:** 22-year-old Naruto hadn't really been thinking when he had asked for guardianship over Uchiha Sasuke, five years ago. But now that Sasuke was a ninja, Naruto finds he has little choice but to come out of retirement to keep Sasuke in line. [AU, no pairings.]

**Disclaimer:** I do not own Naruto.

* * *

**Jacksonian March**

chapter three

_stitching on the pattern_

* * *

**NOTE FOR PAST READERS:** Chapter two has been completely revamped; PLEASE go back and read that before you read this chapter.

* * *

Uchiha Sasuke was having a bad day. Technically, a bad morning, but he wasn't in the mood to deal with semantics.

Mornings had always been both a routine and annoyance for Sasuke. This one hadn't been much of an exception, even if the reason it irked him differed from the norm. He was still in the process of figuring out if the typical routine or the change in it bothered him more.

Usually, things went like this:

Naruto would get up first (a fact of life that would forever confuse Sasuke; other than his morning risings, the blond tended to be uselessly lazy to the _bone_), roll Sasuke literally out of bed, and bark out his annoying laughter while dodging the array of objects that Sasuke would throw (including the sharp, weapon-shaped things kept under Sasuke's pillow). Sasuke would get his morning migraine, take a shower (usually a borderline-lukewarm one, as Naruto liked hogging the hot water), and scowl while Naruto forced food down his throat. They would then go about their own business for the day, rarely running into each other out in the village.

He had _hated _that routine.

But now that Naruto had taken it upon himself to break the tradition, Sasuke found that he hated _not_ having the routine just as much.

Naruto had gotten up first as usual, but he hadn't terrorized the sleep out of Sasuke's system like he always did. Instead, he had left quietly, leaving nothing but a cup ramen and a note on the kitchen table for Sasuke to find when Sasuke had groggily woken (_naturally_ woken, the first time in five years) at the insistence of the morning light.

_Sorry, had some stuff to take care of. Eat this and go on ahead, okay? I'll catch up later._

Sasuke had thrown both the note (well-crumpled by his fist) and the ramen into the trash before leaving the apartment for the designated area.

He hadn't been the first to arrive; Aburame and Hyuuga had been there to greet him when he had strolled onto the training grounds. Sasuke had grunted out a response, planted himself next to a log, and had gladly lost himself to his thoughts.

Looking back on the morning routine that he had indulged for the past five years with a clearer and enlightened mind made him notice a few things. For one, the signs of Naruto's prior involvement as a ninja were almost blatantly obvious. For all his idiocy and clumsiness, Naruto had continually managed to escape the morning unscathed, chalking it up to luck or that Sasuke never had _real _intentions of hitting him (this was a claim that had been repeated made with such mind-boggling confidence to the point of being bewildering). Sasuke had always accepted these explanations with no more than a roll of the eyes.

There had been other giveaways as well, especially in the way Naruto moved from time to time: his silent footsteps, his shoulders stiffening at the slightest noise that was off a tempo from the ordinary, how he seemed to watch for specific birds in the sky.

In the light of yesterday's revelation—_I used to be a ninja_—everything made sense, but it still irked him that he had dismissed the truth as impossible, fooled by Naruto's natural inclination towards the moronic.

The sound of crunched grass drew him out of his thoughts, making him look up to the sight of Chouji and Shikamaru (who was, once again, supported by his friend) approaching. Their footsteps felt too loud, and the noise only proceeded to fuel Sasuke's growing agitation.

"Morning," Shikamaru greeted with a yawn.

"G-good morning, Shikamaru-kun," Hinata greeted back.

Shino and Sasuke both gave the newest additions to the group a mere nod, neither finding it rewarding enough to exercise their voices.

"Where's Uzumaki?" Shikamaru asked.

That was a question specifically geared towards him. The corner of Sasuke's eye twitched in irritation upon realizing that all four attentions were suddenly pinned on him, awaiting his answer. He said shortly, "Sidetracked."

The answer was accepted graciously with no further questions. Minus the occasional complaints Shikamaru would mutter to Chouji, silence fell upon them quickly. Sasuke withdrew his hands from his pockets to cross his arms as he returned to his musings.

He supposed that compared to the general excitement of yesterday, the morning had been strenuously normal. _Too_ normal, too peaceful_. _It made him feel restless.

It had been five years since Naruto had (forcefully) adopted him. Even now, it was still rather unclear as to where the line between the 'okays' and 'not okays' (in terms of prying and sharing their respective pasts). They had this odd, un-negotiable (and silent) agreement between them that stated that there would be no questions that dug too deep into their respective pasts. They wouldn't go any deeper than the other party was willing to go. Naruto never asked about his family, his brother, or the massacre in general. He never treated him differently even on the anniversary of the day, carrying on the routine in a carefree manner that often left Sasuke both envious and thankful. He had enough pitying looks from the villagers on a _normal _day as it was. In return, Sasuke tried not to ask about—well, just about _everything_.

Even _his_ pride was able to admit that that latter instance was an error on his own part—having information was rarely detrimental. Sometimes dangerous, yes, but detrimental? No. (Sasuke wasn't going to think on that any more than that. It was too early for philosophical self-arguments.)

And yet, Sasuke couldn't help but feel that this sudden break in routine was in response to the breach in privacy that Sasuke had instigated last night. Certainly, Sasuke hadn't gotten anything more than a confirmation—_I used to be a ninja_—but that wasn't the point here, was it? The point was that he'd broken their agreement by entering Naruto's room with the intension of snooping (and getting caught), and Naruto had apparently decided it was necessary to break routine in a passive-aggressive show of—

_He's not you_, Sasuke's mind cut in viciously. _The idiot doesn't _have _the brain-power to do passive-aggressive_.

Which was true.

—was this situation his fault, then? He scowled at the thought.

No, it wasn't his fault. How could it be? It was natural to want information about the person you lived with, wasn't it? He had held out for _five years_ without questioning, holding up his side of the bargain. Naruto keeping quiet about Sasuke's situation shouldn't count either, since any adult worth their salt knew about that day. About Itachi. His had been an open secret.

Was Naruto so tight-lipped about things because Sasuke was too young? Did he think that Sasuke would not be able to understand?

Sasuke frowned, and then grudgingly disregarded the idea.

If there was one thing that the blond idiot was good at, it was to utterly _suck_ at being condescending. So much so that Naruto hadn't even tried, not once talking down at him. Even yesterday, when he had almost been killed, Naruto had spoken nothing of it, hadn't said a _word_. He hadn't demanded a thank you or a sorry for freezing in such a pathetic manner. He had treated it as if it had never happened in the first place even when Sasuke knew that there was no way in hell it was _not _bothering him—the moron was often too sentimental for his own good.

"Yo!"

Sasuke looked up in annoyance when Kiba's voice rang loudly across the field, making Hinata jump and Shikamaru roll his eyes. Shino and Chouji seemed unaffected.

Kiba gave the training ground a look over before he opened his mouth.

Sasuke, having anticipated the question, found it in his best interest to answer it before the query was outwardly expressed. "Not here," he stated flatly.

Kiba snapped his mouth closed and frowned, remaining silent for two more seconds before he fired back with another question. "Then where is he? I still need to give him a piece of my mind!"

Akamaru yipped, as if in agreement.

"What now?" Shikamaru asked with a sigh.

"You remember it, don't you, Uchiha?" Kiba gave Sasuke a quick glance, and expanded upon meeting Sasuke's blank stare. "When you brought that asshole to bring-your-parents day at the Academy?"

The blank stare remained.

Shikamaru, on the other hand, smirked. "Ah."

Chouji looked as confused as Sasuke felt, but thankfully seemed to have little qualms in voicing it out loud. "Huh? What happened?"

"Kiba called him a loser," Shikamaru explained, "And Uzumaki gave him an ass-poke."

Sasuke flushed without meaning to, and quickly turned his face away; he had also been the victim to the said ass-poke, just once before. While he could not recall the exact time and moment that Naruto had subjected Kiba to it, Sasuke had the first-hand experience to know that it was not anything that he'd wish on anyone else with clean conscious. Well, except Itachi, but there were very few, if any, fates that Sasuke would spare Itachi from.

"It's called the Leaf's Super Secret Technique: One Thousand Years of Pain."

All inhabitants of training ground seven snapped their attention simultaneously to the foreign voice that had come from their right. A woman dressed in an altered version of a med-nin's uniform—minus the hideous headpiece—approached them, a hand raised in greeting while wearing a smile of utmost amusement. She wasn't very tall (maybe two inches shorter than Naruto), but there was an air of maturity and confidence that made Sasuke relax almost immediately. The aura around her was not unlike the aura around mothers, adding a glow to her otherwise plainly cut hair and a face free of make-up.

"Who are _you?_" Kiba demanded.

The woman straightened a little and placed both hands on her hips. "Why don't you introduce yourself first?"

"Inuzuka Kiba," Kiba announced proudly, and pointed down to the pup wedged in his coat, "And this is Akamaru."

Raising an eyebrow, the woman turned her attention to the rest of them. "And yourselves?"

Everyone took their turns introducing themselves, and Sasuke had been about to take his turn when a strange light entered the woman's eyes when her gaze landed on him. It made him stiffen, keeping his words stuck at the back of his throat.

"Hello, Uchiha Sasuke," the woman filled in for him, laughing lightly, "I have to say, it's a little weird seeing you without Naruto hovering around."

The five of them blinked.

"You know the idiot?" Sasuke frowned. And what was up with that comment?

"Oh, I don't think there's anyone in this village that _doesn't_," the woman winked. She turned to face the group, and gave them a warm smile. "Anyway, it's really nice to meet you all. My name is Rin. I'll be the instructor for Team Two. That'd be... Shikamaru, Chouji and... Ino, wouldn't it?"

As if on cue, there was a breathless, _I'm here! _from the distance, revealing a rather winded Ino charging across the training grounds with Sakura close at her heels.

"Good morning, Sasuke-kun," Sakura greeted him with a small giggle and a shy motion of tucking a strand of hair behind her ear.

Sasuke grunted in response.

"Where's Naruto-san?" Ino asked, looking around.

It was the third time in less than twenty minutesthat he had been asked that question. Irritated, Sasuke gave her an equally short answer, his voice sharp. "Sidetracked. Not here. Isn't that obvious?"

"You don't need to be so rude about it, Uchiha," Ino snapped, "What crawled up _your_—"

"He's probably going to be a little late," Rin intervened. She sighed softly, but quickly shook herself out of whatever morose mood she had slipped into. "So... you're Ino?"

"Yamazaka Ino, at your service!" Ino did a mock salute for effect. "Are you my Jounin instructor?"

"Your _team's _instructor," Rin reminded her gently, "I guess we could go, since everyone's here. I hope you guys had something to eat."

"Why?" Shikamaru asked, his voice weary.

"You'll be taking on your first mission today." Rin's eyes sparkled. "Exciting, isn't it?"

"Wait!" Ino gnawed at her bottom lip, and then slapped her palms together in front of her face, bowing her head a tad in a plea. "Can we wait until Naruto-san gets here? _Please? _Just a few minutes to say good morning."

Rin blinked. "Hm. I don't see why not. I wouldn't mind saying hello, myself."

"Do you know him, sensei?" Ino asked excitedly.

"Mm, we used to be sort-of teammates before. It's been a while, though," Rin nodded. Sasuke immediately started on the analysis of her features, comparing the shape of her eyes, nose and mouth of the girl in the photo he had seen last night. Then she suddenly perked up, distracting him from his examination. "Oh. Hello, Kurenai."

"Good morning," a voice from behind him said.

Sasuke jumped, and his lips thinned into a line in annoyance when a snicker sounded from the general direction of Kiba, Shikamaru and Chouji.

The newcomer—Kurenai—barely gave him a glance before she turned her odd red eyes on the group, interrupting any bantering that might have taken place in the light of Sasuke's surprise to her soundless approach. "Inuzuka Kiba, Hyuuga Hinata, and Aburame Shino?"

"All present," Rin answered as the three in question shifted in response to the call.

"Good." Kurenai gave her team a reserved, but warm, smile. She paused soon afterwards, looked up at Rin. "Is there a reason you haven't left yet?"

"Just waiting for Naruto," Rin answered lightly.

"I see," Kurenai nodded, "Well, Team One, follow me."

And it would be another hour after Team One's departure that two male-shaped silhouettes came into view from the depths of the village, and another ten minutes for them to become completely visible. Sasuke tried not to grind his teeth at their speed.

One of them was definitely Naruto in all his orange glory while the other—a man in a Jounin vest with silver hair with an eye covered by his forehead protector and the lower half of his face covered by a mask—was most likely the instructor for Team Three. Sasuke had to fight a sudden, sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach as he noticed the rather lazy stride the man seemed to be sporting, and how he seemed to be returning Naruto's undoubtedly idiotic comments in a way that made Naruto laugh and grin (meaning his response must have been just as idiotic, or worse—even _more _idiotic).

"Naruto-san!" Ino beamed when the two finally came within hearing distance, "Good morning!"

"Eh? Morning, Ino!" Naruto laughed, and gave her a light pat on the head, "You're looking good. Say hi to your dad for me when you get home, okay?"

"_Naruto,_" Rin cut in, her arms suddenly crossed and her voice sharp, "And Kakashi. What're your excuses this time?"

Naruto and the newly-named Kakashi exchanged a look before they spoke at the same time.

"I got lost—"

"There was an old woman that needed help—"

Idiots. He only had idiots on his team. Sakura giggled nervously from a position to his left, and Sasuke resisted the urge to stab them all.

* * *

D-class missions were as boring and time-consuming as Naruto remembered them to be. They were currently at the edge of some obscure gorge, scouring its adjacent fields for a shitty little flower that their client had dramatically informed them as the only herb capable of curing her incurable illness. Naruto thought it was a load of bull, but Kakashi apparently hadn't.

At least, he thought bitterly, the view was good; the cliff was overlooking one hell of a valley. The air was clean, and the sun was shining. Look on the positive side of things. Right.

"Stupid mission," he muttered. He sighed heavily.

"What's the matter, Naruto?" Kakashi drawled, "Cramped feet?"

"Bite me," Naruto growled back, and stopped to sit on a large rock that cast a particularly large shade. The granite was cold against his rear, but even _that _was felt to be a small break from the monotonous walking that the mission dictated of them. He rubbed at his eyes, fighting the exhaustion that had stubbornly stuck around even after a night of dreamless sleep, regretting the fact that he hadn't taken the time to pick up the prescribed chakra replenishers. "Couldn't you have picked a better mission than this?"

"The other option was herding goats," Kakashi answered, his eye glued still to the words of his book, "Would you have liked that better?"

"At least _that _would have been more exciting than plants."

"I'll keep that in mind."

"Naruto-san! Kakashi-sensei!" It was Sakura's voice from a little further ahead, slightly muffled by the distance. "I think we found one!"

"You're the best, Sakura-chan!" Naruto called back, still not moving. He looked up at Kakashi. "Hey, aren't you going to make us do some self-introduction thing?"

Kakashi shrugged. "Don't see the point."

"Let's do that when we're finished," Naruto suggested, "I wanna hear their answers."

"Naruto!" It was Sasuke's voice this time, edged with a level of agitation that made Naruto wince and draw him immediately back onto his feet. There was a soft, short noise that sounded suspiciously like a chuckle from Kakashi's general direction; Naruto turned to glare at him.

"What?"

Kakashi chuckled again, creases of laughter curving his visible eye into something more crescent-shaped. "Ah, nothing. Why don't you go help your _teammates?_"

"Why don't you come help us, _sensei?_" Naruto scowled.

"Sorry, I'm busy."

"Yeah, reading porn!" Naruto made a swipe for the book, but Kakashi leaned back a fraction, easily dodging the uncoordinated motion. "Argh!"

Kakashi flipped a page lazily. "Better get a move on. Sasuke seems about ready to kill you."

"If there's anyone he's gonna kill, it's gonna be _you!_" But Naruto had made a run for it even before he had finished speaking, approaching a crouched Sakura and a cranky Sasuke by the ledge of the cliff. He pointedly avoided eye contact with the latter as he kneeled beside the former, casting a critical eye over the plant on a ledge about a head below from where the two were inspecting it.

"Is this it?" Sakura asked, looking a little pained. She kept brushing back the bangs of her hair, mumbling complaints about the heat and sweating too much while shooting Sasuke little looks.

"Uh, I think so." Scratching at his head, Naruto withdrew a crumbled piece of paper from his pocket to compare the drawing to the plant in question. He grinned. "Yep, this is it! Sasuke, go on ahead and see if you can find any more of these, will you?"

Sasuke complied without sound, walking off with his hands shoved in his pockets, head moved languidly from side-to-side in a half-hearted attempt at looking for the plant. It made Naruto raise his head in surprise (and alarm). The last thing he had expected was for the kid tostalk off in silence without a snappish retort. Uchiha Sasuke was _never _quietly obedient.

Naruto promptly pinched himself, and winced.

Okay, so _not_ a dream. Then what was wrong with Sasuke?

"Um... Naruto-san?"

Drawn back into reality by the meek interruption, Naruto blinked, and laughed sheepishly, "Sorry 'bout that. What is it, Sakura-chan?"

Sakura smiled back shakily. "Is something wrong?"

"Other than this mission being a waste of time? Nah. Everything's peachy." Naruto quipped, hefting himself onto his stomach so that he could properly reach the flower. He viciously severed the plant from its perch when he wrapped his hand around its stem, drawing out its roots and all. "Hey, hold out that bag for me, will you?"

Sakura complied. Naruto shoved the plant inside.

Satisfied, Naruto sat up and straightened back to his full height with one smooth push of his legs. He offered a hand down to Sakura after dusting them off, and the offer was taken with some impressive amount of blushing. It made him chuckle as he pulled her up, amused at her nervous antics. They were even a little endearing, in a way.

"Don't be so nervous," Naruto said when she drew her hand away, "I don't bite."

"Sorry, Naruto-san." Sakura averted her gaze. "It's just... yesterday. You don't seem like a—"

"Hey," Naruto said gently, interrupting her. "Forget about it. If it helps, just think of me as... uh, some loser who failed his Academy exams a thousand times or something."

"I can't do that!" Sakura exclaimed, eyes wide.

"Sure you can," Naruto grinned. "Just ask Sasuke. I'm sure he'll find it _super_ easy."

Sakura looked away from him then, turning her gaze to follow the path that Sasuke had taken. Naruto raised an eyebrow at the ensuing expression that settled across her face, but did not speak. His efforts at remaining silent were eventually rewarded when Sakura finally asked, "Um, have you known him for long?"

"Who, Sasuke?" At Sakura's nod, he shrugged. "Five years, give or take. Though maybe a little longer by association."

Sakura gnawed on her lower lip. "I heard that he lives with you..."

"He does. Guess you could call me his parent? Adopted guardian? Something like that," Naruto grinned at her, shook his head. "And listen, I'll let you in a little secret."

Eyes growing wide, Sakura leaned forward, a seemingly unconscious gesture, and gazed at him with expectancy that shown with naivety and youth.

"He's lazier than you'd think," Naruto said gravely. Sakura's face fell, and Naruto felt a pinch of guilt—what, had she been expecting something more grandiose? Aiming to quickly remedy the situation, he added, "So I need you to stick close to Sasuke and make sure he doesn't slack off today, okay? Think you can do that, Sakura-chan?"

Sakura's face was shining again. "I-I'd love—I mean, of course!"

"Okay then." Naruto leaned back and made shooing motions with his hand. "Go on ahead. I'll catch up once our _sensei_ gets here."

As soon as the period dropped on the end of his sentence, Sakura was gone.

"You got dumped," said Kakashi, his voice entirely amused as he strolled up to Naruto's side.

"I'm not into little girls," Naruto said dryly, "Man, I had my doubts, but she's another one of Sasuke's fangirls, isn't she?"

"One of the worst ones," Kakashi admitted with a bored shrug.

"Great," Naruto groaned. He rubbed at the back of his head and glanced at Kakashi. "How many of these things were we supposed to find, anyway?"

"We have to fill the bag."

Naruto paused. Then he scowled, throwing up his hands in the air. "But that's going to take the entire day!"

Kakashi was merciless, only humming as he flipped a page of his book. "I hope you had a big breakfast."

Naruto ignored him, too caught up in his righteous rage as he ground his teeth in frustration. "Seriously, the entire _bag?_ We've been here for like a million hours already, and we've only found _five_ of those stupid things! I'm never going to get to visit Iruka like thi—"

His rant was cut short when he felt the ground beneath his feet vibrate in an echo of the passing unnatural amount of energy—_chakra_—through it.

A jutsu. A _doton_, to be exact.

He shared a sharp look with Kakashi, the implications of such technique not lost on either of them, especially in the light of yesterday's hostage situation. It didn't help that a scream (_Sakura's_) sounded half-a-second afterward.

Naruto didn't waste any time moulding his chakra and throwing himself in the general direction of that scream, arriving just in time to watch Sakura's impending fall. He only took a moment's glance toward Sasuke to make certain that he was alright; the kid _seriously_ had some crazy luck, apparently having _just_ stepped off the range of the _doton _that had ripped the earth from underneath Sakura's feet. The girl's body had just vanished beyond the ledge of the cliff when Naruto hurled himself down the cliff too, soaring through air by the force of gravity until he felt steady enough to flick himself forward (_that's the first one_—), positioning his body into reappearing right next to Sakura.

"Grab onto me!" he yelled, already snaking his own arms around her smaller form.

She did as told without hesitation, wrapping her arms tightly around his neck as they continued to fall. She was still screaming, but Naruto could barely hear it over the blood and adrenaline that rushed to his head.

"_Naruto!_" he heard Sasuke shout in the distance. Strange how he could still hear the kid, though. He'd _definitely_ picked up some form of selective hearing over the years.

He tried to shout something in response to help ease away that look of half-fright and half-anger on the kid's face as the distance between him and Sasuke grew. He tried to give a thumbs-up, a grin, _anything_ to look reassuring; he really did. But it was hard when they were still falling. Breathing was becoming very taxing very fast, and Naruto was quickly becoming aware of the fact that they were too far from the edges of the cliff for him to use as leverage. That only left one more option.

Sucking in one last breath of determination, Naruto freed an arm from where it was wrapped around Sakura and jerked it forward once, twice, as though he was throwing shuriken up into the air. When everything was in place, he quickly moulded his chakra to begin flicking both his body and Sakura's upward (_two-three_), and upward (_four-five_), and upward (_six-seven_) until they were finally higher than the ledge of the cliff itself. One more flick (_seven-eight_) and they were suddenly flying right across the gorge. God_damn_, he hated doing this mid-air. Limited control, shitty distance (not even air was impervious to gravity); it was the worst hand you could get out of a jutsu like his. Or any other jutsu, for that matter.

The rest of his thoughts were effectively clobbered out of him when he felt his body pummel into a tree, his back hitting the bark a numbing amount of force. His mind briefly went white with pain.

It was lucky for Sakura that they were positioned the way they were; his body had cushioned hers from the impact. Of course, that only meant that he wasn't as lucky, and he felt it. The impact had driven his lungs to give out, robbing him of every ounce of oxygen at once. Vaguely, in between his own gasps for air, he heard Sakura's wheezing and felt her body shudder as it came down from the adrenaline rush.

_Out of a cliff and into a tree. Man, any cool points I won yesterday..._

He barely had enough time and energy to squeeze out a smile, starting to mouth some comforting words for Sakura before the world teetered and went black.

* * *

It had been the summer of their second year at the Academy that Ino had suddenly shifted her attentions away from Sasuke to an older man with sun-kissed hair and disarming smiles. It had been a sudden shift, almost shocking in a way. Other than the colour of his eyes (a glowing violet; it was as pretty as it was unusual) and his hideous orange jacket, the man had been so plain, so _boring_ in comparison to Sasuke. At least in Sakura's eyes.

Sakura couldn't even fathom the notion of dropping out of the race for Sasuke's attention. She still couldn't. But she hadn't dared voicing her confusions; she had made a point _not _to. With Ino infatuated with someone else, Sakura had both lost a rival in love and gained back her best friend—it had been the best-case scenario. Satiating her curiosity just hadn't been worth compromising that by inadvertently reminding Ino why Sasuke had caught her (their) attention in the first place.

She thought she could understand Ino's crush a little better now.

Sakura wasn't entirely sure just how long they lay there, with Naruto unmoving from where he was wedged in between Sakura and the tree. She was still too stiff with fright to edge away from him, resting her head on his chest as she tried to gather her thoughts. His heartbeat was a comforting noise against her eardrums, rhythmic and strong. The arms around her felt so reliable and reassuring, silently pledging to her that no harm would come to her. It was a feeling she'd felt once before, she thought. If only she could remember _where_—

A cough wracked the body that had pillowed hers, and it was only then that Sakura realized that Naruto had probably been unconscious for the duration of the silence between them. Sakura winced upon realizing that she had completely ignored the possibility of Naruto getting hurt, so caught up in her own terror as it were. An apology had been half-way up her mouth when he spoke, cutting her off. His voice was a little raspy, overlain thickly with pain.

"... Sakura-chan?"

Having aborted her plans on apologizing (for now), Sakura found herself only capable of nodding mutely. She carefully looked up at him, her breath caught itself painfully in the back of her throat when she met Naruto's tired smile. She felt something _snap_ then, and suddenly, her eyes were stinging with tears.

"Naruto-san!" she cried, throwing her arms around him.

"Oof!" he grunted. Sakura was only vaguely aware of the man's laboured breathing and the stiffness of his muscles, but found that she couldn't tear herself away, gripping at him pathetically.

God. _God_, she had almost _died_. The memory was still viciously unsullied at the forefront of her mind along with the emotions: the shock. The anger. The hopelessness and regret, the paralyzing _fear._

"Shh. It's okay now, Sakura-chan. It's okay..."

Oh. She remembered now.

Once, back when her rivalry with Ino had been fresh and hurtful, the Hokage had found her crying in the field that she had used to go picking flowers with her friend. He hadn't asked for an explanation (he hadn't needed to; Sakura had told him of her situation without prompting), merely opening his arms to offer a hug that Sakura had desperately needed. He had held her much like the way that Naruto was holding her now: full of warmth and promises of protection and unconditional affection.

... Ino was going to get _so _jealous.

"You're smiling," Naruto commented idly. He grinned down at her. "Does that mean you're done with the crying?"

"Y-yes," Sakura sniffled, smiling back, "Thank you, Naruto-san. For—for saving me." _Again_, her mind added.

"No sweat. That's what teammates are for," Naruto told her gently, "We look out for each other, remember? I watch your back, you watch mine."

Sakura nodded mutely. As nice as those words were, what could _she_ possibly protect this man from? The prospect that they were of the same rank and on the same team suddenly felt like a joke, mocking her with the blatant schism between his abilities and hers.

"Anyway, you're not hurt?"

"I—I don't think so," Sakura answered, "Just... a little sore, I think."

Naruto smiled again, waggling his eyebrows to elicit a shaky giggle from her before finally giving her a meaningful nudge. Sakura blushed, scrambling away from him to rise to her feet as fast as possible without jeopardizing her balance. Naruto laughed heartily, undoubtedly at her embarrassment, and followed suit. His movements were slow, punctuated by suspicious little pauses. Sakura watched him anxiously, gnawing on her lower lip; had he been injured _that _badly?

"Hey," Naruto said, cheerily interrupting her thought process, "I can just _hear _you worrying in there. Stop it. Seriously, I'm just tired."

No, the man was definitely hurt. She could see it in the way that he kept shifting his weight between his two feet, wincing and grimacing as he tested each of his limbs while muttering lowly under his breath.

"Alright, I'm good. So! Think you can get down?"

"Huh?" Sakura blinked, snapped out of her ruminating.

"Jumping down. From up here," Naruto said, looking amused again, "You okay with that? Unless you want me to carry you."

"No! No, I'll be okay," Sakura said quickly.

"Okay," Naruto grinned, and leapt off.

Sakura breathed in once through her nose before following his lead back down to the ground. Her legs shook when she felt the (_steady_) earth beneath her feet again. The relief was almost enough to make her kiss it. She resisted the urge though, instead falling onto her rear and gripping at the sparse grass with shaking hands. Releasing a shaky sigh, she squeezed her eyes shut to gather her bearings.

"Hey. Hey, Sakura-chan, look at me," Naruto was saying. She did as he asked, opening her eyes and blinking. "I know you're probably real tired, but you gotta tell me something. Do you remember seeing or hearing anyone before you fell?"

Before she fell? Sakura scrunched her brows together in thought.

"No..." she said slowly, "I was... um, talking to Sasuke-kun before it happened..."

"Oh," he said lamely, looking distinctly disappointed.

The tone with which he spoke that word made her flush and feel hotly ashamed of her answer. Sakura quickly lowered her gaze to the ground, lower lip jutting out in both confusion and irritation. Okay, so maybe ninjas _were _always supposed to be as aware as possible of their surroundings, but she had been _busy_. It wasn't every day that she got to be alone with Sasuke, and she had wanted to make most of it. Besides, hadn't it been _Naruto_ that had told her to stick close to him...?

_Stop trying to blame Naruto-san,_ she thought at herself, gritting her teeth as the humiliation that she felt suddenly double itself.

"I'm sorry," she said meekly, "But um... I think—" She stopped, feeling a little foolish. At Naruto's expectant look, however, she found the courage to continue. "I don't think that ledge broke by accident. I know it sounds silly, and maybe I'm just paranoid from last night—" Oh god. _Last night. _She never wanted to think about that night ever again. "But it felt similar to the kind of jutsu that those Chuunins had used... and. Uh. Naruto-san?"

One of Naruto's eyebrows had risen with every word she had spoken until it had disappeared behind his bangs. Then after some moment of consideration, the man carefully took a seat next to her, leaning back against a tree. "Hey, how'd you do at the Academy?"

She blinked, a little confused at the sudden change in subject, but answered shyly, "I was always best at theory."

"Thought so," Naruto nodded.

"Why do you ask?" Sakura asked.

"Because you're right. About the Chuunin thing," Naruto said with a small smile. Sakura felt herself flushing in pride in response as the blond went on, "That's why I appeared so quick. I felt the _doton _go off from where I was talking to Kaka—I mean, to our sensei."

"I see," Sakura said. She worried at her bottom lip, "Do you think—"

"Maybe. But don't worry about it. Guys like that? The ones that target Genin? They're usually as stupid as they're weak, so we'll catch 'em if they're still around," Naruto told her. He gave his chest a thump with his fist. "I'll do it myself if I have to."

"That's really reassuring," Sakura said, failing in her attempt to tease Naruto by ending up meaning every word.

Naruto seemed to get it though, as he flashed her with another one of his patent grins before changing the subject, "So, number one in theory?"

"Sometimes," Sakura admitted, "Not always though. Most of the time, Sasuke-kun could beat me."

She wasn't bitter at Sasuke over it though; she couldn't remember a single time that she might have been. Sasuke was _Uchiha Sasuke_; no one beat the Uchiha genius in _anything._ Not for long. After sharing your Academy years with someone like that, you got used to fighting for second place. Still... she glanced down again. It would've been nice to have been number one in _something_, if only to prove her worth.

"Sasuke's a special case," Naruto said quietly, head craning upward toward the sky.

"He seems to listen to you," Sakura said, looking at him.

She hadn't seen the two interact for too long (barely half a day, to be specific), but it had been plain as day that Sasuke acknowledged and _respected _Naruto in a way that he didn't anyone else. She would've be lying if she claimed not to feel even a little bit jealous, but after the demonstration of Naruto's skill during the disasters of yesterday and today, it wasn't hard to see why Sasuke would. Why _everyone _would be hard pressed _not _to admire him. Comparing herself to Naruto was like trying to compare apples and oranges; or, perhaps more appropriately, like comparing a Genin to the Hokage.

"Are you kidding me?" Naruto snorted, "That little bastard never listens to a thing I say. _You idiot_ this, _you moron _that. And he's always dissing ramen! _Ramen! _But get this, when he gets hungry enough? He'll eat it all and never leave me any. That's just _cruel_, don't you think?"

Sakura felt a small smile twitch her lips upward.

Naruto tilted his head in her direction, violet eyes shining. "C'mon," he said, getting back onto his feet, "We'd better head back before Sasuke dies from high blood pressure or something. Oh man, he's probably pissed as hell..."

Sakura took the hand offered to her, and frowned a little in confusion. "He'd be angry?"

"_Pissed_," Naruto vowed solemnly.

* * *

_That idiot!_

That was the extent of Sasuke's thoughts as he broke out into a sprint, senses ablaze as he sought a probable method by which he could cross the gorge. He certainly couldn't replicate that blond _idiot's_ method; he wasn't even sure _what _Naruto had just done.

He had seen that jutsu in action last night, but seeing it again, in broad daylight, had been entirely different experience altogether.

Naruto had been flying. He had left only a smear of yellow when he had disappeared, and by the time Sasuke had turned his head to look at Sakura's situation, Naruto had been already falling with the girl. He felt that he understood the scream—_yellow flash!_—from one of the Stone ninjas a little better now after having watched Naruto disappear again and again in an upward manner. The idiot had fought gravity, and he had _won_; he'd flown little higher with every push. By the strained concentration that Sasuke had caught on Naruto's face before the idiot had flown right across the gorge, he didn't have to be told the difficulty with which Naruto had accomplished the feat. But still, the idiot had been _flying_.

If there was at least _one _thing he was going pry out of that idiot's mouth, it was going to be the secrets to that jutsu.

It was only after Sasuke finally found a way across the gorge—a suspension bridge that he quickly ran across without second thought—that he regained enough logic to quickly scan the area for their Jounin-sensei's presence.

His next step faltered a bit when the scan came back as negative. Sasuke's lips thinned into an irritated line.

He hadn't liked the man the moment he had laid eyes on him, and this was only serving to nurture that dislike. What kind of Jounin _was _Kakashi when the bastard was apparently all too willing to go MIA in a situation like this? Sasuke didn't enjoy depending on others (it was _weak_), but right now, it wasn't about him. It was about _Naruto_ (and Sakura), and how the idiot had _thrown himself off a cliff_ and had defied gravity for several seconds in to save Sakura's life. Sasuke wasn't entirely sure who he was most irritated with: Naruto, for being a self-sacrificing idiot, Sakura, for being so helpless, or Kakashi, for being _missing._

Whatever. Sasuke could (_would_) take care of this.

"Hey!" he yelled when he finally stepped into the forest that he had seen Naruto fly into, "Where are you, you idiot? Answer—"

Sasuke cut off the words half-way, body growing momentarily rigid before he threw himself onto his stomach to dodge the array of shuriken aimed at his head.

Keeping his breathing even and his mind sharp, Sasuke pushed himself back onto his feet. As his new attacker had been absent on his scan for Kakashi's presence earlier, he didn't bother doing it again; it'd be a waste of both time and energy, neither of which could be spared. Sasuke drew out a kunai and pivoted to the right, left and backwards as a second, third and fourth barrage of weaponry rained down on the ground on which he had been previously standing.

Then, there was silence. It didn't last for however, however, as the slow, rhythmic noise of a golf clap, coupled with rustle of foliage soon filled the ominous quiet. Sasuke whirled around to face the disturbance, kunai gripped tightly and extended half an arm length away from the rest of his body.

When his assailant finally came into view, Sasuke froze again a different reason altogether. It had only taken one glance at the man's face to have made his eyes grow a little wide. The features were badly mutilated, but the man wasn't beyond recognition—not yet.

"Mizuki," Sasuke said lowly, hand sliding slowly to his weapons pouch.

This was the bastard that had been responsible for the nightmare that Sasuke had simply classified away as 'yesterday'. Former teacher and fellow ninja of the Hidden Leaf, reduced to something even lower than dirt by the village that he had even _dared _to betray.

The clapping stopped, and Mizuki grinned a grin of tangible insanity and desperation. Sasuke twitched at the sight, suddenly feeling annoyed that he had even met the _eyes _of a traitor.

Sasuke had half a mind to demand how, exactly, Mizuki had escaped the village and its (in)famous Interrogation Force, but it was far too reasonable to doubt that he'd get a straight answer to such a question. So instead, he settled with hissing out, "What do you want?"

Mizuki opened his mouth, and—nothing came out. Just hollow passages of air from within the man's chest to the outside world.

Sasuke frowned. Had the Interrogation Force removed the man's voice? Something struck him as _wrong _in that particular observation, but he didn't have the time to look into that observation right this minute. Perhaps he could think about it in more depth after he'd neutralized the threat.

Mizuki's eyes were wide and bloodshot, his grin only widening (somehow) when Sasuke sunk further into a readied stance. Sasuke knew right then that there was no point wasting anymore words on this man; the village had beaten any and _all _semblance of lucidity out of Mizuki. While that was good and all (actually, Sasuke approved of it a whole lot; traitors (_like Itachi_) deserved those wounds, and _more_), that spelled only trouble for Sasuke for this specific moment.

The traitor drew out a kunai of his own, and exercised what was left of his facial muscles into a mockingly solemn expression while the tip of the weapon across the skin of his neck. Then Mizuki pointed the blade at Sasuke, and gave a single incline of the head. The movements were expressive enough that Sasuke could easily decipher the man's meaning without a single utterance.

_Die, _the traitor was telling him.

Lips thinning, Sasuke spat the words that initiated the impending battle, "Like _hell_."

* * *

**Notes: **So after some extreme absence, I return! Thanks to **kma3000** for sending me a PM which then reminded me that I actually had drafts of this story on my HD. No promises on how regular the updates will be, but I found my footing again so let's cross our fingers and hope for the best... at the very least, chapter four is 90% written and will be up as soon as I'm finished editing it.

If you are old readers (the few of you that may be) that missed the note up top, **please go back and read chapter two again**. It's been edited heavily and new scenes had been added to make this story flow more smoothly than the original version.

As usual, all comments, constructive criticism, and questions welcomed. Thanks for reading!


	4. chapter four: setting the tone

**Summary:** 22-year-old Naruto hadn't really been thinking when he had asked for guardianship over Uchiha Sasuke, five years ago. But now that Sasuke was a ninja, Naruto finds he has little choice but to come out of retirement to keep Sasuke in line. [AU, no pairings.]

**Disclaimer:** I do not own Naruto.

* * *

**Jacksonian March**

chapter four

_setting the tone_

* * *

"What is this?" Kakashi deadpanned.

"It's not human, but otherwise, I'm not sure," Pakkun answered with a canine version of a shrug, "You can't blame me for being unable to sniff out anything else."

The mangled bag of flesh and bone could barely be called a body anymore, and the sight of it was only trumped by its atrocious odour. It smelled like blood, smoke, and decomposition all at the same time; with a smell this strong floating around, he really couldn't blame Pakkun for being rendered incompetent. Even his own senses, tempered by years of training and survival, felt like they were dampened by this rare display of savagery. Taking a deep breath, Kakashi leaned away from the corpse at last.

Ninjas were not tame warriors, trained from childhood to turn the living into the dead, but true sadists, the ones with that aimed to main and torture rather than to kill, were actually very few in number. Speed and stealth were the only two skills that dominated over power; after all, if you could neither find nor hit your target, no amount of chakra or jutsu would dictate you as the winner. As such, death that was dealt by a ninja tended to follow the pattern of being impeccable and _neat_. Controlled. Mechanical. Killing like they _should_ have been trained—clean and quick.

This particular kill was neither.

Cruelty was the only word that came to Kakashi when he had inspected this corpse. Alternatively, it could also be a poor (but unfortunately effective) imitation of a ninja's kill.

Pakkun hopped onto his shoulder, inspecting the body curiously. "Hm. Bad smells aside, it doesn't seem foreign. It's a decoy, Kakashi."

"I gathered as much," he sighed. He quickly performed the seals to a small _katon_ jutsu, blowing the fire over the sack of meat to dispose of it.

"Hmm..." Pakkun murmured, "This guy's good."

He disagreed. If the body had been better hidden, its pieces scattered across a small radius, maybe he'd be willing to admit that this was _decent_. This type of 'good' was nothing more than a strange form of pride that usually formed in young ninjas, making them forgo stealth in favour of a confrontation. It made them confident that they could defeat anyone. Kakashi should know; he had gone through that stage before, and knew how difficult it was to grow out of it.

'Ninja puberty' was what he liked to call it.

That wasn't the only possibility, of course. It was just the most _probable _one. The next explanation down the list of probable explanations was that this foe was so gone that they could no longer comprehend that a keen attention to detail and an intricate web of deception was necessary to deceive a Jounin-level opponent.

"Not very strong," Kakashi murmured, "But well-informed. Not a lot of ninjas use scent to mislead enemies."

"Hm. Yeah, they like genjutsu more," Pakkun mused. He hopped down from Kakashi's shoulder when the corpse was finally overtaken by the smokeless fire, sniffing at the ground. "Oh, here we go. I got something."

_Finally._

"Hm? Wait, Kakashi," Pakkun interrupted. Kakashi paused in mid-leap when the dog took a few steps toward the direction from where Kakashi had come. It was the direction where Kakashi had separated from Naruto, believing the other man to be capable of taking care of his two students (two, not three, because really, Hokage-sama couldn't possibly expect Kakashi to be Naruto's _teacher_ of all things). He had silently agreed to take on the tracking duty simply because he was _better_ at it, just as Naruto was better at protecting people. Naruto adhered to an Obito-like philosophy more than anybody else that Kakashi knew (beyond Obito himself). He trusted Naruto.

So what was this strange sensation—_concern_—that now twisted at his instincts? Kakashi frowned.

"Pakkun?"

"This is bad," the dog murmured, suddenly breaking out into a sprint.

Kakashi was quickly to tail him, catching up and matching the canine's pace with ease.

"Whoever made that mess is with Naruto right now," Pakkun told him without missing a beat or slowing down.

"Can you tell who it is?" Kakashi asked, grabbing Pakkun by the scruff so that he could increase the speed with which they were moving, each jump propelling him forward, branch to branch. It really were times like this that he wished he had set aside the time (and the effort) to properly copy Naruto's _Hirameku_ jutsu.

Then again, that jutsu was most likely Naruto-specific, just as the _Hirashin_ had been specific to the Fourth. It was incredibly useful, fatal to any non-ally to have the misfortune to catch glimpse of it, but it was a pain in the _ass _to decipher. Even if his Sharingan had told him how to copy it and he had enough knowledge of seals to duplicate the necessary ink-work, he simply didn't have the affinity. Nor the chakra reserves, in Naruto's case.

He'd tried once, in secret. Just once. On top of entirely draining him absolutely _dry _of chakra, it had run him face-first into a tree. So embarrassing.

"Yeah, I can tell," Pakkun sighed in response, "It's no wonder they knew how to mislead you, Kakashi."

Kakashi frowned down at the dog. "Stop beating around the bush. Who _is_ it?"

"Touji Mizuki," Pakkun said simply. "Village folk would know your style of tracking, wouldn't they?"

Better than Stone ninjas, that was for certain, but not _this_ well. As a Chuunin, Mizuki couldn't have _possibly _known Kakashi's style in, well, anything. Not to mention it was no small feat to escape _Morino Ibiki's _unit with enough sanity intact to set up such a deliberate plan. Neither of those was possible (or even feasible)—not unless he had had help.

Resolutely ignoring the headache that was threatening to come into fruition behind both his temples, Kakashi forced himself to stop and switch directions, hitting his top speed as he raced toward the village, toward where Ibiki and his men were most likely scouring the streets for the wayward convict.

Barely 24 hours after agreeing (ordered) into overlooking Naruto's Genin team, and he was already knee-deep in a mess like this. He definitely deserved a raise.

* * *

A large majority of their walk back was conducted with a comfortable, companionable silence. She'd never been too big of a fan of silences like these before, but Sakura found herself growing increasingly fond of this peace; it was a strange, but welcomed, experience.

The few conversations she shared with Naruto were scattered in between the silences, mostly on little things like what her plans were for tomorrow, her favourite type of food, her experiences at the Academy. These little exchanges were all that either of them had energy for, both too worn and tired (for differing reasons) to carry the conversations any longer than beyond the quick question and answer sessions.

It was another few minutes into the most recent of their silences that had settled between them when she saw it. She squinted a little; it hadn't been too far off from where they were currently standing, and—_there!_ There was it again. The movements of a figure (figure_s_, maybe?) that danced within and across the shadows of the trees.

An animal, maybe? The movements were too messy and too disorganized to belong to even a civilian. She had been on the verge of glancing up at Naruto for his verdict when the light was finally cast on the mystery figure.

She'd have recognized that hairstyle, dress style, and posture _anywhere_.

"Sasuke-kun!" she called out to him, delighted. She laughed a little in relief, waving enthusiastically as to catch his attention.

Catch it she did, as Sasuke seemed to stiffen, his spine going rigid before he turned to look at them. Sakura's smile faltered when she got a glimpse of his expression: eyes narrowed, angry and tense, _pained_. His mouth opened, but couldn't get past uttering the first syllable—_Na—_as his face met the cold dirt of the forest soon afterward, kicked down from behind. He choked out a strained noise while Sakura let out a noise that was half-shriek, half-gasp, hands flying to her mouth in horror when a foot planted itself firmly (and non-too-gently) on Sasuke's head, keeping him pinned and, for the moment, immobilized.

"_Sasuke-kun!_" Sakura screamed, and emitted another shriek when Sasuke's assaulter looked up.

Was that _Mizuki-sensei_...?

She'd been two steps into a sprint before she was forced to stop to properly gape, barely understanding what was happening when she saw Naruto _materialize_ (hadn't he been standing behind her just a second ago?) right next to Mizuki, twisting his body to slam his foot into the man's side. Mizuki's mouth seemed to flap open and closed without sound as he was flung right off of Sasuke, the force of Naruto's kick landing him several feet away.

Sakura blinked, feeling both relieved and a little amused that the encounter had ended so soon and in such an anticlimactic manner. Relief eventually won out when Naruto bent down to haul Sasuke up by the collar of his shirt. Ssasuke didn't seem hurt _too _badly, if the impressive scowl on the Uchiha's face was anything to judge by. Sakura felt her legs shake and eventually give out in relief.

"Idiot," Sasuke snapped, ripping himself away from Naruto.

"Oi," Naruto sighed, his shoulders sagging, "Can't you _at least_ lay off the insults, until—"

It took a moment for Sakura to properly process the next series of events.

_Blink_, and the next thing she was knew, her body was being yanked back onto its feet mercilessly by the _thing _that grabbed at one her wrists.

_Inhale_, and then said wrist was being twisted around to be kept pinned against her back.

_Exhale, _and finally, she was becoming dimly aware of an aching shoulder, the muted thrumming of fear under her skin, and something warm and wet dripping onto the skin of her face.

Time sped back up to normal. Her eyes widened.

_Oh my god_, Sakura thought hysterically.

"Heya, Sakura-chan," Naruto said with a strained smile. "Do me a favour and look away, okay?"

She didn't. Or rather, she _couldn't. _Her focus was entirely on the blade of a kunai that had obviously been en course for her eye, stopped only in its tracks by an arm. Literally, if she was seeing things right. This arm, _Naruto's_ arm, was the only thing that was standing between her and the loss of an eye and _worse_. A well-aimed strike to the eye with a kunai with enough acceleration and force was an efficient way to kill someone. Sakura _knew_ that from her studies. Right now, she knew it _so _well that she trembled under the weight of it.

There was a meaty sound of a bladed weapon moving further into flesh, followed shortly by the impact of a hand meeting a fist. Turning her head upwards, Sakura could see that the arm, indeed, belonged to Naruto, while the fist that held the kunai belonged to—

"_Naruto!_" Sasuke was yelling from somewhere behind them.

_That's wrong, Sasuke-kun, _Sakura thought numbly. This wasn't Naruto, but _Mizuki-sensei._ The man that had catalyzed the trauma of 'yesterday' to single-handedly cause the highest casualty rate in Academy students under twenty-four hours. Mizuki-sensei. Touji Mizuki. _Traitor_.

"Breathe, Sakura-chan," Naruto kept murmuring as if willing her to use his voice as her anchor, "Breathe and calm down. I'm here."

... That's right. He was.

Sakura closed her eyes briefly, sucked in a breath, and forced herself to concentrate. To _focus. _Compared to the terror that she had experienced at the hands of the Stone ninjas (_watching her classmates get systematically slaughtered, never knowing it was going to be her turn to die next—_), this was manageable. She had Naruto on her side from the get-go this time. She could think through this. Sakura forced her eyes open.

The three of them were wrapped around each other in an odd puzzle, she immediately noted. One of her arms was twisted behind her back by one of Mizuki's hands, while the other hand of the former-instructor was gripping the kunai that had been aimed for her eye (and the brain behind that eye). Naruto had somehow intercepted the weapon during its downward trajectory, using his own arm as a shield against damage—to Sakura, at least. The blood that had dripped down from Naruto's arm onto her face still hadn't dried completely. In fact, Naruto still hadn't pulled the kunai out, though that was probably for the better; as soon as the weapon was pulled, there would be more bleeding. Swallowing past that thought, Sakura went on with her narrative: following the stab to his arm, Naruto had brought his other hand around to grip at Mizuki's fist, keeping him immobile and handless for as long as the man kept Sakura captive. That latter ailment afflicted neither Sakura nor Naruto.

Sakura met Naruto's gaze briefly.

_Go for it_, Naruto's eyes were saying.

In response, Sakura bit down on her lower lip and used her free arm to elbow at the man behind her. She followed it up quickly with a heel to a shin. Neither were particularly powerfulblows, she knew, but coupled with the punch that Naruto had aimed at Mizuki`s jaw? That was more than enough to get Mizuki to loosen his grip on her arm, and Sakura wasted no time in scrambling away, toward where Sasuke was standing.

To her unending surprise, Sasuke reached out to grab her by the upper arm to help steady her when she came within reach. "Hurt?" he asked briskly.

Sakura shook her head. She felt rather traumatized, yes, but bizarrely not hurt.

"She's fine!" Sasuke called, probably to Naruto.

"Sasuke-kun?" Sakura finally managed, "Are you... are _you_ okay?"

"I'm fine," Sasuke said shortly, but it lacked its usual venom and dismissal. Sakura would later realize that this was the kindest that Sasuke had ever spoken to her, but that time was not now. Right now, she was too distracted by the lingering cuts and fresh bruises marring the Uchiha's pale skin, standing out as neon-coloured beacons to Sasuke's claims to be 'fine'. As if reading her mind, Sasuke scowled a little. "They're not deep. Doesn't hurt."

It _looked_ like it hurt, Sakura thought dazedly, but she decided not to badger him. There were more important things going on.

"What's Mizuki-sensei—I mean, what's _Mizuki_ doing here?" Sakura whispered, grabbing a kunai out of her weapons pouch.

Sasuke didn't answer her. Sakura hadn't expected him to.

Sakura turned her attention back to where Mizuki and Naruto were standing, now apart. She could tell that Naruto was saying something, but it was too quiet for her to properly pick up on. Moreover, from the way that Mizuki was swaying to and fro aimlessly, it was easy to tell that the man lacked any semblance of a mind with which to formulate proper answers. Thus, it was pointless to question him. Naruto seemed to reach this conclusion around the same time that Sakura did, as shortly after she finished confirming the observation, the blond exploded into action.

Naruto got in about a punch and a kick before the ground beneath his feet began to melt and break for no apparent reason. Sakura's eyes widened for the second time (_Mizuki didn't cast anything! I didn't see any seals—_) as she watched Naruto slip and become imbalanced with a startled yell. It was that instant of distraction that Mizuki struck back, using the momentum of his swinging forearm to bodily knock Naruto aside, sending him crashing into a suspiciously placed well of mud.

And then? Mizuki was on them.

_No, _Sakura thought, watching with dim horror, _not 'us'. He's after—_

Sasuke had barely knocked away a stream of shuriken when Mizuki came up close and grabbed the Uchiha around the neck with wordless, but no less crazed, intensity. Sasuke let out a choked sound and promptly brought his kunai down into the flesh of the arm keeping him prisoner, but Mizuki seemed barely affected, as though he couldn't feel pain. Sasuke's kicks and flails were also having little effect, as the former-instructor was using his longer reach to keep Sasuke from striking him in anyplace vital while bringing up his other hand to help in strangling the life out of Sasuke instead, and—

_Sasuke-kun is going to die!_ Sakura thought frantically. What could she do? From the way that Mizuki had brushed aside Sasuke's kunai, non-fatal wounds weren't affecting Mizuki in the slightest, which only really left one other option, and. And... Sakura felt bile rise from the pit of her stomach at the next logical thought.

_And_. That other option was to kill. But could she? Could _she, _a girl that was second-best at theory, kill this man? (Could she kill _at all_, to draw out the last breath from the body of a once-living man as Chouji had done last night?)

Thankfully, fortunately, before Sakura could gather the courage to do what was quickly appearing to be necessary, Naruto came between her and Mizuki again. Perhaps it was the panic and hysteria, but Sakura found herself noticing the mundane detail that Naruto hadn't simply _appeared_ this time, instead coming into her view at a more human speed (using the _Shunshin_, maybe?). That was about the extent of that thought, however, as Naruto immediately propelled himself forward, using his momentum and weight to turn himself into a human battering ram to slam against Mizuki's side.

Sasuke gasped upon being released, his own hands flying up to his throat as he crumbled to his knees on the leaf-strewn floor of the forest.

"Sasuke-kun!" Sakura cried, falling onto her knees by Sasuke's side as soon as fear released her from immobility. "Sasuke-kun, are you o—"

"I'm... fine!" Sasuke snapped, his each word coming out as a pained wheeze. He shook his head a few times and glanced around. "Where—?"

"Ah, don't worry your pretty little head about that, Sasuke-kun," said another voice.

Both of them looked up to the sight of their silver-haired Jounin-sensei coming to kneel by them. Kakashi did not further speak, favouring to gently peel Sasuke's hands away so that he could get a better look at the fresh bruises that the Uchiha was now sporting. Sakura felt herself blanch at the purpling marks of an attempted strangulation marring Sasuke's throat.

"You'll be fine," Kakashi said after some length, "The marks won't fade for a couple of weeks, but those horrible shirts of yours cover much of your neck anyway."

"You shitty... useless... Jounin!" Sasuke wheezed out in response, lacing Kakashi with a glare that could melt iron, "Where the _hell_ have you... been?"

Kakashi's single eye curved into a crescent-moon shape, giving away the fact that he was smiling underneath that mask. "Oh, that. See, I accidentally broke a mirror, so I had to find a psychic to dispel that 'seven years of bad luck' curse."

Sakura stared at the man in bewilderment while Sasuke bared his teeth in righteous fury.

"Hey, seven years of bad luck _is _pretty serious," Naruto suddenly cut in, popping into Sakura's vision with such stealth (or had it simply been inattentiveness on her part?) that it made her jump in surprise. He knelt in front of Sasuke, eyes grazing the marks on the Uchiha's neck critically. "You alright?"

Rather than repeating his snappish answer of _I'm fine_, Sasuke instead muttered, "Yeah."

It would _definitely _take her a few months to get used to this mulish compliance that Sasuke showed Naruto from time-to-time, Sakura decided.

"Good," Naruto said with a sigh. He shifted and shuffled over to Sakura next, and with a tired smile, he suddenly announced, "Disclaimer! I'm not a child molester. This is for your own good, etcetera, etcetera. It'll just take a second, okay?"

Before Sakura could ask what Naruto was talking about, she found herself startling as she felt a quick hand run down the length of her arm. "Wha—"

"Your arm should be fine too, Sakura-chan. Just some bruises," Naruto said as a way of explanation. "You did good, by the way. It takes a lot to not to freeze up while being held hostage."

"Naruto-san," Sakura choked out in response. She quickly ran her good arm across her eyes, preventing the tears from falling and squinted at him a little. "Your wound. Are you—?"

Naruto showed off his arm to highlight the tourniquet tied around it. "Emergency treatment. But it's not that serious. Probably will take a med-nin about five minutes to heal this."

"That's good," Sakura managed weakly. She rubbed at her eyes again and squinted some more. "Um—Naruto-san?"

"Hm?"

"I think I might have to faint now," she announced feebly.

Naruto looked startled, and seemed to exchange a look with someone to his right. Probably their Jounin-sensei, in that case. Sakura didn't dare look at Sasuke while she was feeling this weak and pathetic, so far from the shining example of female beauty that she was used to showing off in hopes of interesting the Uchiha. But she couldn't stave off the oncoming unconsciousness even if she tried. After all, she'd fallen off a cliff, had flown _across_ the said cliff with Naruto, got held hostage, nearly lost an eye and watched Sasuke get strangled in a single half-day. Fainting was long overdue.

A warm hand fell on top of her head. When Sakura glanced up, Naruto was wearing an amused, but fond, expression. "You do that, Sakura-chan. I'll get you to the village safely."

"I trust you," she announced, and promptly did exactly as she'd announced, falling into arms that she was quickly beginning to equate with _safety_.

* * *

Naruto was tired. No, scratch that. Being 'tired' didn't even _begin _to cover how he was feeling right this moment.

D-level mission _his ass_. He should have known better than to have complained about having a boring mission for the first time (in a long time) in his life. With hindsight as his ally, Naruto felt that instead of complaining, he should have been _celebrating _and thanking whatever God that might still be watching over a guy like him that things were going to plan. But he hadn't, and look what happened. Sakura had fallen off a cliff, Naruto had flown into a tree, Mizuki had apparently escaped, and Sasuke had almost died. Again.

There were minor things like getting _stabbed_ too, but like had told Sakura, that would heal. As soon as he saw a med-nin (preferably Rin), the wound wouldn't even scar.

Naruto adjusted Sakura's weight against his back as Sasuke, Kakashi and he made the journey back to the village on foot. At normal speed.

At any other time, Naruto would have complained, but he didn't, and there were several reasons as to why not: number one (and the most important), Sasuke didn't look _nearly _as fine as the brat had claimed. Two, he was almost entirely drained of chakra. And finally, Naruto wasn't too keen on waking poor Sakura. Such was the rationale as to why they were moving at this turtle speed, trekking across the forest as though they were regular civilians.

Naruto sighed.

"You want me to carry her?" Kakashi asked from his right, his voice made barely audible as to escape Sasuke's notice.

Naruto shook his head and responded in a similar fashion, "Nah. I promised to get her to the village, so that's what I'll do."

Kakashi withdrew his book of porn and flipped it to a random page. "Suit yourself."

Silence fell on them again, but Naruto found himself appreciating it, their re-earned peace. He'd known that his second entry into this profession would likely rip apart the textbook example of the ninja profession (Genin to Chuunin, followed by Jounin and ANBU if one was talented enough) to shreds, but for it to happen this _early_, on their first mission? Not even his special brand of paranoia and pessimism had foreseen this. Naruto had had _plans _for the day—after this mission, he had been planning to treat both Sasuke and himself to Ichiraku`s for a job well-done. Then he would have visited Iruka again, and maybe take the time to badger Rin a little about her new Genin team. And finally, at night, he had been planning on enjoying a long bath, soaking up the hot water and telling himself (convincing himself) that _this wasn't so bad_.

Well, there went _those _plans.

Swallowing another sigh and a burst of irritation that erupted from deep within his chest, Naruto closed his eyes and counted backwards from ten, calming himself down for the next few minutes of hard mental problem-solving.

There were a number of irregularities to this situation, but the main one, perhaps the one that was connected to everything else, was the mystery of Mizuki's escape. One did not simply _walk _out of Ibiki's unit. Even if the unit's physical location—underneath a particular building that stood close to the center of the village—had been negated in some form or fashion to allow an easy escape, Mizuki would have had to outsmart or overpower the countless number of ninjas employed at Torture and Interrogations. He would have had to have sidestepped _Morino Ibiki_.

While Naruto was weary of classifying _anything _as impossible, this was coming to be rather close. Touji Mizuki, a Chuunin-rank traitor of the Leaf that had been freshly broken by methods of unspeakable torture, could _not_ have escaped. Not by himself, anyway. Someone had had to have helped him, and it was highly likely that it had been that very same 'someone' who had tipped off his team's primary location for the day. While the latter component did not narrow down the suspect pool significantly, the former did. By a lot, actually.

The accomplice was someone of great power, influence or both—someone that could access a traitor responsible for terrible crimes. Someone that the Torture and Interrogations unit had allowed to meet Mizuki in private.

There were other things that Naruto would confidently add to the list of crimes of this accomplice (or was it more accurate to call them the 'true conspirator'?) as well—three _doton_ jutsus (the ledge, Naruto's imbalance, and that annoying spot of mud), all strategically aimed at separating Sasuke from the rest of the team so that Mizuki could pick him off with ease, and the removal of Mizuki's voice. Looking at those in isolation, it would be so _easy _to conclude that this accomplice had enlisted the help of any lingering Stone ninjas, but somehow...

_No. No way,_ Naruto thought firmly.

Danzo would never hire the help of the Stone. The man was twisted, yes, but he was also fanatically loyal to his village. If Danzo _was _the one responsible for the events of today, no one but the members of the Leaf could have been involved.

But, of course, this was nothing but conjecture. There was likely no evidence to Danzo's involvement; the man probably hadn't even visited Mizuki's holding cell at all.

Naruto lowered his head a little, just shy of hanging it in a brief, overwhelming sense of defeat, eyes closing half-way.

Then there was the headache-inducing possibility that it _hadn't _been Danzo, but 'someone else'. Someone that no one was aware of, a force in the shadows that was plotting to take Sasuke's life. How could anyone be expected to defend a kid from something like that?

"Don't fall asleep on your feet, idiot," Sasuke suddenly rasped, breaking Naruto out of his stupor.

"I'm not," Naruto responded with an exaggerated roll of the eyes, "If I do that, I'll drop Sakura-chan, and then she'll never forgive me for ruining her pretty hair."

Sasuke managed to snort disdainfully despite his damaged throat. Those Uchiha genes were quite amazing.

Naruto resisted answering immediately, forcing himself to wait for the moment to pass so that he could answer the unspoken question with seriousness. "I'm fine, Sasuke. Just a little tired."

_Liar_, Sasuke's half-glare was accusing.

"Yeah, maybe a little bit," Naruto admitted with a crooked smile.

Sasuke blinked in surprise.

Carefully dislodging an arm from where it was bracing Sakura's weight against his back, he carefully lowered it on the boy's head. The fact that Sasuke didn't immediately bat it away with an incensed scowl told Naruto just how bad he looked, effectively killing the light-hearted words that he'd been planning to utter next. Clearing his throat, Naruto removed his hand from the boy's head unprompted.

"I'm almost out of chakra," Naruto finally confessed, pitching his voice as to include Kakashi in the discussion, "I have _just _enough to be carrying Sakura-chan and walking, to be honest."

"_Hirameku_ count?" Kakashi asked, not missing a beat.

"_Flash of thunder?_" Sasuke translated with a confused frown.

"You know my technique?" Naruto said mildly. He gave a nod to when delighted suspicion immediately flitted across Sasuke's expression. "Yeah, that one. Exactly the one you're thinking about right now. It's called _Hirameku no Jutsu._"

"Rank, class, description?" Sasuke asked quickly, eyes flashing with the first real hint of life since their unfortunate encounter with Mizuki.

Kakashi did Naruto a favour and reached over to bop Sasuke on the head with the spine of his book. "Sasuke-kun is so naughty. Don't you know that asking a ninja about his jutsu is like asking a woman for her weight and age?"

"You shitty Jounin—" Sasuke began to snarl.

"Ten," Naruto quickly intervened.

As planned, both Sasuke and Kakashi's attention snapped back to him.

Kakashi gave a low whistle while turning a page of his book. "Living on the edge, eh, Naruto?"

"Ten's the number of times that I can use _Hirameku_ per... day, I guess," Naruto explained to Sasuke while simultaneously ignoring Kakashi's comment. "It's a damn good technique, but it takes a shitload of chakra. So any more than ten, I'll probably collapse from chakra exhaustion. Even ten's pushing it a little, so I usually keep it capped it at eight."

Sasuke opened his mouth, and then snapped it shut without comment. Much to Naruto's surprise, Sasuke merely gave a curt nod of acceptance for the bland explanation and turned his gaze away in continued silence, most likely with the intention of digesting the information in his own head.

"You need to see Rin about it?" Kakashi asked after Sasuke's appeasement, his voice once more falling down to a volume inaudible to the Uchiha.

"She prescribed me some chakra replenishers last night," Naruto responded with a minute shrug, "About six of those and a good night's rest will probably fix me right up."

"You sure you're not taking this too lightly, Naruto?" Kakashi murmured, tilting his head toward Naruto a fraction.

"Rin asked the same thing," Naruto grinned, "And I'm gonna tell you exactly what I told her: I'm not. I know my limits better than anybody, remember?"

Kakashi emitted a noncommittal hum, but dropped the subject to begin another. "What did Ibiki say?"

"About Mizuki? Nothing. He has no idea how this happened," Naruto sighed, remembering Ibiki's badly concealed ire behind his typical show of stoicism. It was a testament as to how much this had unnerved the man, and it was a well-known fact that things that could unnerve Morino Ibiki could easily cause a heart attack in any lesser ninja. Naruto kicked a rock in irritation and watched its trajectory with no real interest, simply using the predictable motion to help ground him as he gathered his flayed thoughts. "I'm not too hopeful that we'll get to find out either, even when I took the pains of turning him over to Ibiki-san alive. Mizuki can't talk, and he's probably too broken to write anything coherently. Which also rules the Yamanaka out, probably. The only thing we can say for sure is—"

"Sasuke was the target," Kakashi finished. His single eye lifted itself from where it'd been glued to the pages of his book to give the Uchiha a discreet, but no less assessing, stare. Then it swerved to glance at Naruto instead to communicate Kakashi's sardonic amusement. "Can't say that I'm particularly surprised that your charge is turning out to be quite troublesome, Naruto."

"Bite me," Naruto bit out.

"That nasty habit of making difficult promises is gonna get you killed someday," Kakashi sang obnoxiously.

"_Bite me_," Naruto repeated with more vehemence.

"Pass," Kakashi chuckled. He flipped another page. "Maa, look on the bright side."

"_What _bright side?" Naruto said petulantly, indulging Kakashi's routine.

Kakashi's eye curved into the crescent shape to give away the fact that he was smiling underneath his mask. "You won't have to look after him on your own anymore."

Naruto gave Kakashi an incredulous stare, flabbergasted at the prospect of something akin to _words of comfort_ had just been voiced by Kakashi's voice by the man's free will. But when that astonishment passed, it left behind a warm feeling that was quickly spreading from his chest to the tips of his fingers. Suddenly feeling embarrassed (for the both of them, actually, not just for himself. They were grown men having a _heart-to-heart _moment in the middle of the goddamn forest, what the hell), he only allowed his lips to curl upwards acknowledgment and gratitude for Kakashi's words when he was confident that the bangs of his hair was curtained his eyes.

"Yeah," he said, voice barely above a whisper, "Guess there _is_ that."

* * *

_Hirameku._ The technique was called _Hirameku_, translated as a 'flash of thunder'. From what Sasuke had seen of the jutsu, he felt the name was rather appropriate.

In the end, the only thing Sasuke had managed to pry out of the combined forces of Naruto and Kakashi had been the fact that the jutsu was chakra-heavy and that even Naruto could only use it to about eight times comfortably. Ten, if necessary. It wasn't much to go on, but Sasuke had seen the technique in practice twice already, once in close-quarters. One more look at the jutsu _should _give him enough data to make a reasonable conjecture, and Sasuke _knew _that he would get to see it again. Naruto's pattern and style of attack seemed to place that single technique at its core, depending on its lightning-fast execution and versatility to conclude Naruto's battles in under an hour.

But everyone knew that it was never a good idea to depend on a single jutsu during a fight, especially against an Uchiha. Oh, that didn't mean that Sasuke wasn't planning on lifting (copying) that jutsu from Naruto (the technique was far too useful to disregard), but he would use it differently. Not as a center technique but as a simple (but powerful) accessory. Even _Itachi _couldn't have seen a technique like _Hirameku _before and Sasuke was counting on that element of surprise to have maximum effect. The tipping point, if you will.

Sasuke shook his head then, reminding himself firmly: _don't rush_.

The reason that he was not giving the jutsu as much thought as he truly wanted was to prevent any misconceptions and false expectations from taking root in his mind—after all, jutsu were best learned with a fresh mind. He only needed to see _Hirameku _one more time. Just one more time. Then, compounded with the abilities that the Sharingan (once it was awoken) would grant him in the near future, that jutsu would be as good as his. He just had to be patient.

Sasuke flinched when he felt the foreign fingers of a medical ninja brush against a particularly painful spot on his neck, the pain effectively knocking him out of his monologue.

Shortly after the explanation of the technique, Naruto, Kakashi and he had covered the rest of the distance to the village in relative silence, with only Naruto's increasingly ragged breathing to disturb it. Sasuke hadn't found any reason to discourage the quiet so he hadn't, especially not when his head had seemed content to switch between being so full of thoughts that it had felt close to bursting and feeling completely empty, circling around the broad subject of _Naruto_ (and everything Naruto-related like that jutsu and the blond's tight-lipped history) and the specific incident of his strangulation.

Once they had arrived at the village, Kakashi had turned and lead them straight to the hospital, marching them at a more brutal pace that neither Sasuke nor Naruto had protested. Naruto's silence had been something of a surprise, but Sasuke suspected that the idiot had only complied out of his duty toward Sakura and his unnecessary worries over Sasuke's welfare despite having been told that Sasuke was _fine_. If anything, by the time that they had reached the hospital, Naruto had looked worse off than Sasuke had ever felt in his lifetime (minus a singular event five years ago, of course), which was further supported by the way with which the hospital staff had only needed one good look at Naruto to promptly relieve him of Sakura and order him to go lie down. Compared to that, Sasuke had only been ushered into a separate room for a quick check-up for the bruises on his neck.

Sasuke touched at the bandages that the med-nin had finished wrapping around his throat, and nodded in response to the instructions of how to take care of it for the next week or two.

"The rest of your team is in room 104," the med-nin told him next.

Sasuke was quick to vacate the examination room after that.

When he entered room 104, Sasuke saw that the room's two beds were occupied by Naruto and Sakura. The latter was still unconscious, sleeping peacefully on her side while the former was on his back, his eyes overlain with a bandaged arm. Naruto's other arm was resting by the blond's side in such a way that the palm was facing up toward the ceiling. When Sasuke's eyes trailed down to the joint, he saw the reason for which the blond was humouring his arm's unnatural placement: there was an IV line that connected Naruto's arm to a bag of clear liquid. That single addition to Naruto's image had a more jarring effect than Sasuke could ever expect, making him frown and uncertain as to how to process the image before him. The blond had flipped from appearing indestructible to looking frankly rather pathetic in less than forty-eight hours; Sasuke couldn't decide which of the two images was the more accurate of the two.

The next thought was not any less insane, as Sasuke found himself hoping (_praying_) wildly that the blond wasn't being drugged right now. Naruto was a headache even when he was _lucid_, much less high.

"Good of you to join us, Sasuke-_kun_," said a (infuriating) voice from behind him.

"You're still here?" Sasuke snapped, turning half-way to face his useless Jounin-sensei, who was currently leaning against the wall next to the door of the room, nose buried in that orange book of his.

"Of course I am," Kakashi said with a nonchalant shrug. He didn't even bother to look up. "It'd be irresponsible of me to simply abandon my team in their time of need."

"You'd no qualms about that just a few hours ago," Sasuke snorted.

Kakashi lifted his single-eyed gaze from the book to pin Sasuke in place. "Oya, Sasuke-kun is the grudge-holding type? How petty. Naruto raised you all wrong."

Sasuke flushed in hot embarrassment and rage, and felt his hand snake itself down to where his pouch of shuriken was resting.

"God, shut _up_. Both of you!" came a tired voice from Naruto's bed. "Seriously, Sasuke. Lay off Kakashi about that, okay? And Kakashi, stop baiting the kid. How old are you two, five?"

"That's rich, coming from you," Sasuke said tetchily, but obediently severed his attention from Kakashi so that he could walk over to Naruto's bed and take the single chair planted beside the bed. Giving the blond a critical once-over, Sasuke added, in a more quiet tone of voice, "Are you staying here overnight?"

"Nah," Naruto said, lifting his arm away from his eyes. The eyelids peeled back open with obvious effort, rewarding Sasuke with a frontline seat to a dull violet gaze, its usual bright hue dimmed by exhaustion and barely concealed pain.

Sasuke clenched his fists on his lap. "Well, maybe you should. You look like shit, idiot."

"Is that _worry_ I hear?" Kakashi said obnoxiously from his spot on the wall.

"Shut up, Kakashi!" Naruto yelled back. To Sasuke, he merely gave a quirk of the lips. "I'm a fast healer. I should be good to go after a couple of hours." He squinted at Sasuke. "What about you?"

"I got a salve for the bruises," Sasuke said dismissively.

Naruto laughed softly and closed his eyes again. "Good. Okay."

Irritated for reasons that he could not quite comprehend, Sasuke breathed out and counted to ten while leaning back in the chair as Naruto relaxed into his bed and evened out his breathing in a good mockery of slumber.

They stayed like that in a semi-comfortable silence until there were noises of stirring from behind Sasuke, from Sakura's bed. Sasuke shifted a little to glance back at her, but Naruto beat him to the punch verbally—not that Sasuke minded; Sakura seemed prone to losing any brain cells that she _hinted _at possessing whenever her speaking partner was him. He was beginning to learn that it was for the best to allow Naruto to handle the difficult girl.

"Sakura-chan?" Naruto said quickly.

"Naruto-san?" Sakura responded blearily, "Where...?"

"The hospital," Kakashi contributed. To Sasuke's surprise, Kakashi put his book away as if that had been his cue, hands tucking themselves into the pockets of his pants as he approached the patients and Sasuke, stopping to stand in between the foot of the two adjacent beds. He then clapped his hands together with such vigour that he accomplished three tasks at once. That being: jolting Sakura further awake, making Sasuke flinch in surprise, and making Naruto wince in discomfort. "So, now that we're all alive and conscious, shall we do some self-introductions?"

Once again, Kakashi got three separate reactions. Sakura blinked blankly. Sasuke stared, unable to comprehend this level of idiocy. Naruto—

"Are you serious? You want to do that _now?_" Naruto demanded, unwittingly voicing Sasuke's thoughts. He began trying to sit up, an attempt that Sasuke immediately discouraged by putting a hand on Naruto's forehead to shove the idiot back down. "Ow! Shit, Sasuke, what was _that_ for?"

"Language, Naruto-kun," Kakashi said with obnoxious amusement bleeding from every syllable.

"Go die in a fire," Naruto said pleasantly, but Sasuke noted that the blond didn't try sitting up again.

"Mmm... how about no? Or better yet, after you."

Naruto flipped him off.

"Ah, so vulgar. Think of the _children_, Naruto."

"They're good friends, aren't they?" Sakura said suddenly in a hushed tone. Sasuke tilted his head in the girl's direction, and felt grudgingly impressed that she was managing to stave off her usual blush that she tended to sport around Sasuke in favour of observing Naruto and Kakashi.

Sasuke didn't answer her, instead turning to watch the two supposed 'adults' banter back and forth like teenagers, their words full of nothing but barbed insults. But true to Sakura's observations, Sasuke found himself detecting an odd form of comradeship and familiarity underlining the exchange, as though each response had been choreographed and practiced a hundred times before now. Such ease and casualness with which these two were interacting often hinted at previous exposure, one that went beyond coworkers or even classmates. 'Friends' didn't quite fit, however. A teammate, possibly?

Once again, just as he had done with the woman named Rin, Sasuke found himself scrutinizing Kakashi in hopes of matching the man's facial structure—or what he could gleam of it—to the boy that he had seen in Naruto's picture last night. It was difficult to tell, but at the end of it, Sasuke felt reasonably certain that Kakashi was _not_ the boy in the photograph. Had the two idiots gotten acquainted over some other event then?

"Alright, so," Kakashi said after finally breaking away from his verbal tennis match with Naruto, "Self-introductions. State your full name, likes, dislikes, and dreams for the future. We'll... hm. Let's go in descending order of injury, shall we?"

"Show us how it's done, _sensei_," Naruto said mockingly.

"Full name, Hatake Kakashi," Kakashi continued, ignoring Naruto's jab for once, "Likes... I have a few. Some dislikes too. My dreams for the future is—"

"To pen your very own book o'porn," Naruto quipped.

Sasuke choked while Sakura's face exploded into a mortified blush.

"Ahh, now look what you've done," Kakashi sighed, "You've ruined my image in front of my ducklings, Naruto. Don't think you're going to get away with this."

Naruto just cackled.

Kakashi sighed again, but seemed determined to finish his self-assigned task as he pointed at Sakura next. "You fainted, but you sustained less damage than Sasuke-kun over there, so it's your turn next."

"Uh, full name is Haruno Sakura..." Sakura started uneasily. "My likes..." She glanced over at Sasuke, and her blush intensified on top of gasping out a high-pitched giggle. Sasuke closed his eyes and willed himself to ignore her.

"Sakura-chan," Naruto said, his tone underlined by the slightest bit of disapproval.

"Oh!" Sakura startled, straightening a little. Her flush didn't subside, but Sasuke noted that it was less of the schoolgirl-type and more of the brand that spoke of shame. "Sorry, let me try that again. My likes... um, books on theory, I guess? And just... hanging out with friends. Dislikes—" Here, she paused again, her hands curled into fists around the bed sheets as she glared down at her lap. Looking up, she met the expectant eyes of her teammates and firmly said, "I dislike traitors."

Sasuke tensed in surprise.

"Dreams for the future—uh, I... I don't know yet. I mean, I'm only twelve, so I have lots of time to figure that out," Sakura finished. She glanced down at her lap again, and then straight past Sasuke at the blond on the other bed. Whatever she saw on Naruto's expression made her brighten and smile, adding a strange glow around her features. Sasuke looked away, feeling oddly jilted.

"Okay, Uchiha Sasuke-kun," Kakashi said after a moment, "Your turn."

Sasuke laced Kakashi with an irritated stare. "Fine. Full name, as the shit-for-brains Jounin had just said, is Uchiha Sasuke. Likes—" _Training, peace and quiet, having hot water in the morning for a shower for once_— "That's none of your business. Dislikes... guess I have to say 'ramen'." Half a second after that announcement, Sasuke found himself lurching forward when something smacked into the back of his head. When he whirled around, his suspicions were confirmed by the now-pillowless bed of Naruto's. Sasuke scowled, "You—"

"You say you dislike it, but you ate all of my beef ramen _a week ago!_ I know it was you, Sasuke, you can't escape the hammer of justice forever!" Naruto howled at him.

Sasuke resisted in slapping a hand over his face. "For the _last time_, that wasn't me, you idiot!" Actually, it was, but like hell Sasuke was going to admit to that. Hunger and petty vengeance did not discriminate.

"Settle down, children," Kakashi intervened with a longsuffering sigh, "Dreams for the future, Sasuke?"

"Also none of your business," Sasuke muttered. "But the most immediate one is to become Chuunin and kick Naruto's ass."

Naruto scoffed.

Kakashi simply shook his head. "And last but not least—"

"The awesome and great _Uzumaki Naruto!_" Naruto announced with fervour. The effect of his flailing came off to be more comedic than dramatic, resembling a dying, flopping fish. "Likes, ramen. Dislikes, Sasuke _eating _said ramen. Dreams for the future..." The blond clamped his mouth shut, looking a bit pained. Undoubtedly debating whether or not he should be truthful, Sasuke was willing to bet.

Shifting a little in his chair, Sasuke made himself comfortable, waiting for Naruto finish his little internal war. How Naruto spent his days was no big mystery to Sasuke, having once tailed the blond all over the village. Naruto seemed fond of doing the meaningless things like grocery shopping, window shopping, attempting to help old ladies across the street (_attempt_, because strangely, no one in the village seemed to like Naruto very much), and taking a nap on the roof of their apartment building. In other words, Naruto did a little bit of everything while also doing a whole lot of nothing. For all his boisterous energy, Naruto had never seemed to do anything but to _exist_ at the word's most basic level, never truly conducting his life as though he had any other purpose than to bear some intangible burden and to watch over Sasuke.

And so, based on all of that, Sasuke had to grudgingly admit that he was interested to hear the answer, to see if becoming a ninja again had changed anything (because it was obvious that something _had_). From the silences from the other two occupants of the room, it was easy to tell that they were pretty interested too.

It was a good minute or two when Naruto rewarded their patience with words: "To keep my promises," he said.

* * *

**Notes:** This marks the end of the Mizuki/introduction arc. Next up, the Wave! Sort of.

As usual, all comments, constructive criticism, and questions welcomed. Thanks for reading!


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